Because You Loved Me
by Kemma Lee
Summary: The good, the bad. The ups, the downs. The support, and the doubts... most of all: the love. Alice and Jasper from their first few days as strangers to their wedding night. Companion to About A Soldier and Pixie Dust & Premonitions.
1. A Rocky Start

_The style in this part will be slightly different to that of About A Soldier and Pixie Dust & Premonitions. I think it may not skip as much time in between parts, and I have a very strong feeling it'll be longer than ten chapters, but I can't be certain until it's finished._

_I hope you all enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it. To all of my readers: thank you all so very, very much. The only thing that made me happier than writing this series was reading your thoughts on it._

_Thank you. ^_^_

Because You Loved Me

Part 1/?

_**A Rocky Start**_

Finding Jasper Whitlock has been an adventure and a half for Alice. Nearly thirty years she's searched for him. Nearly thirty years she travelled the world looking for the man, quite literally, of her dreams. Now, he's here with her and, though she's expected him, though she knew he was coming, nothing could have fully prepared her for the way she feels now.

Complete, she thinks. Whole.

She's found him. The trick now? Getting him to talk to her.

They've been together almost two days know, and he's barely said more than a few sentences to her. They're staying in a little shack a few miles from town; Alice found it and adopted it to stay in while she waits for her visions. For two days, he's been almost completely silent.

Tonight, he's sitting on a moth-eaten sofa, his face partially hidden by a book that looks as though it's been around even longer than Jasper himself. The black leather spine is clinging to the pages, and Alice thinks that if it were dropped or handled just a bit too roughly it'd fall to pieces.

"Whatcha doin'?" she asks curiously, standing a few feet from him with her hands behind her back.

He glances up at her. "Just reading."

"Oh."

Silence. At loss for anything else to say when he directs his attention to the book again, she sucks her lips back into her mouth, and then pushes them out again with a little _pop_. He looks at her.

"Whatcha readin'?"

When he doesn't answer, Alice frowns and looks at her shoes. They're torn near the toe; she needs new ones. Looking back up at Jasper from underneath her lashes, she studies him carefully. His military coat is muddy, torn at the elbows and shoulders. His boots are in worse shape than her shoes, and she can see a set of scars near the left side of his jawbone that look fresh.

She bites her bottom lip, ignoring the itch in her fingers that makes her want to go sit with him and love the scars away. Locking her hands together, she inches her way over and sits on the very edge of the sofa, as far away as she can without actually sitting on the arm of it.

He doesn't acknowledge her.

Alice scoots closer to him and leans over, peering at the open pages of the book. She reads a random line silently to herself:

_"And the Lord spake unto Moses, When—"_

Jasper snaps the book shut without warning, causing Alice to flinch slightly. "I'm sorry," she says quietly. "What book is that?"

He frowns at her, his stern expression softening a bit. "You don't know?"

"Well, I—no. I don't know it. Is it good?"

"The Bible?" he chuckles. "It's…complicated. This one belonged to my father."

"Oh, I've heard of that. I've seen people reading it, too, and I always meant to get myself a copy, but I never had the time... too busy looking for you. I think I must've been religious at some point," she rambles, reaching into the collar of her blouse and pulling out a small silver cross on a thin chain. "I don't know where this comes from, but I see the cross at churches all the time, so…"

Jasper stares at her. "You _think_ you must've been religious?"

Frowning, Alice chews on the inside of her cheek nervously. She hasn't told him this part; only that she can see the future, and that she's been searching for him for nearly two decades.

"Jasper, I…" she sighs. "Promise you won't get upset and leave?"

The nervousness seems to melt out of her system, and she smiles slightly. It wasn't the first time he's used his gift on her. He'd done this in the diner, too, when she was rambling so quickly that even he couldn't understand her.

"Okay," she says, taking a deep breath that she doesn't need and fiddling with her skirt. "I don't know who I am, Jasper. I only remember waking up one day surrounded by trees, being chased by men and dogs. I don't know why, and I don't know where I was. I didn't even know my name; I learned it from visions of you talking to me. Calling me Alice. But I don't know my last name. I don't even know if I have a family."

Jasper's silent, his eyes fixed on her face as she speaks. When she's quiet again, he frowns and looks away.

"You're not mad at me, are you…?"

"Why would I be? It's not a crime to have no memories, Alice. I wish I didn't, sometimes."

Alice feels a bit awkward now, and she isn't sure if it's her own emotion or something he's letting slip by accident. She gestures to the Bible still in his hands. "What's it about…?"

"Oh," he says, looking down at it. "Maybe you should read it for yourself. I'm not so good at explaining things like this."

"Do you like it?"

After a few moments of silence, he says quietly, "I used to. I'm not so sure, now. I used to live my life by this thing and, now I just – Alice?"

She's staring at him, unblinking, but her mind and vision are far, far away. Her mouth is open, as though she were about to say something, and her hand is frozen in the air. He thinks she might've been reaching out for him.

"Alice?"

As if someone had come up and shoved her from behind, her body jumps forward slightly, and she blinks. "Please don't go," she whispers.

Jasper doesn't make any effort to keep his confusion from her. "What are you talking about?"

"You're about to go hunting," she informs him. "Please don't."

"…I don't understand, Alice."

The tremble in her voice wouldn't be enough for human ears to hear. Jasper does, though. "Please, just stay with me."

He stands. "Alice, I need to go. Especially if you're wanting to travel tomorrow. It's not as easy for me –"

"No, but that's why I want you to stay. Or let me go with you, _please_."

Jasper shakes his head. "You're being silly. I'll be back in just a few minutes."

There's no time for Alice to object before he's out the door. She holds her head in her hands for a moment. He's quick, and she has no idea exactly where the girl in her vision will be.

Still, she has to try.

* * *

Alice is wandering the night streets of the city, desperately searching for the young woman she saw. The one who, if she isn't quick enough, will die at Jasper's hand.

"It's not his fault," she mumbles to himself. "It's all he knows."

She, on the other hand, had seen visions of the Cullens; she knows that humans do not have to be on her diet plan. And they haven't been. In fact, she'd only killed one single time. Not that it's easy for her…

"Where are you, Jasper?" she whispers, inhaling deeply several times, searching for his scent.

Then, just as she's about to give up, the wind blows in the right direction. She takes off in a sprint towards the opposite edge of the city, ignoring the blaring car horns as she crosses the street without looking.

_Give him a good chase,_ she begs the girl that she knows is being stalked right now. _Please, just give me time to get there._

She reaches the outer limits of town within two minutes, and skids to a halt at the edge of some woods. She sniffs.

"Jasper?" He's here, she knows… but where? Secluding herself behind a big old oak, she scans the empty street. She tries to catch a scent, any scent, in the wind.

She doesn't need to go by smell, she realises, when she catches movement at the far end of the road. The girl. She's walking along the sidewalk on her own, and Alice can't imagine why she'd do such a thing in a place like this. Especially at night. Silently, she leaps up into the tree and watches as the girl approaches.

Alice holds her breath, listening for anything, any sound to indicate that Jasper --

_There_.

The girl's passed already, but she's only a few yards away. Alice turns and swiftly slips out of the tree. She drops to the ground, just in time to catch a glimpse of that dark military coat. Sprinting after him, she catches up in a matter of seconds and cuts in front of him.

"Jasper, no!"

A deep, rumbling growl escapes his throat and he glares down at her, his black eyes furious. She stares up at him, her feet frozen to the ground.

"Jasper, you don't have to... just let her go, huh? She's got a family somewhere and - _wait_!" He tries to step around her, but she plants her hands firmly on his chest. She manages to keep her ground for a moment, even begin pushing him backwards, but Alice has forgotten the life he came from. She's forgotten how strong the lust for human blood can be when one is so used to having it right at their fingertips...

She gasps; the decision he'd made was so quick that she didn't have time to see it and defend herself. Her feet are dangling inches above the ground; Jasper's fingers are wrapped around her neck, and his grip is crushing. She stares at him, wide-eyed, looking for a way out.

"Jasper," she whispers, curling her hand around his wrist gently. "Jasper, it's me..." He growls again, his lip curled, his onyx eyes empty, thirsty. Emotionless. "Jasper, it's Alice..."

Very faintly, almost so faint that it was barely detectable, his grip on her throat loosened and his expression softened. His eyes moved across her face, settled on the veins in her forehead that were protruding out; a result of his too tight grip. "Alice..."

She felt her feet touch the ground again, and her hands immediately went to her throat when he finally released her. She sunk to her knees, trembling as she felt unneeded oxygen flood back into her burning lungs. When her head stopped pounding, she looked up to find that Jasper had retreated several yards away.

He's kneeling, his arms over his head and his face hidden.

"Jasper..."

"Don't, Alice."

She stands and takes several slow, cautious steps towards him. "You didn't mean it... I'm not mad at you, Jasper."

"I just came inches from _killing_ you, Alice."

He doesn't sound angry, just shameful. She makes her way to his side and kneels next to him, carefully placing her hands on his arms and pulling them away from his face. "But you didn't."

Jasper stares at her. "I could have. I was going to."

"But you didn't," she repeats. "You chose not to, Jasper, even though you could've sent my head rolling with a simple flick of your wrist, and went on about your hunting without a second thought. But you _didn't_. I'm not going to run away from you, Jasper. I see myself with you, no matter which path you choose. I will always be right here, and nothing's going to change that."

He studies her face; her calming golden eyes, the soft smile on her lips... he hangs his head again. "I'm sorry, Alice."

"I know," she says, seemingly unphased by everything that had just happened. "It won't happen again."

"How can you be so sure?"

Alice smiles, and pushes a blonde curl away from his forehead. "I see the future, Jasper," she whispers. "I see a very, _very_ happy place."


	2. Before It Gets Better

_Disclaimer: _As in all of my writing here, I do not own these lovely characters. Don't sue me...plz... spent all my money on the Twilight DVD. I have nothing left.

-------------------------------

Because You Loved Me

2/?

_**Before It Gets Better**_

They're on the move now, two days after the incident; Alice has had a vision. They broke into a small clothing store, and she changed her skirt for a pair of trousers. The only items Jasper would take were a pair of plain boots and a new shirt.

He keeps track of their movements with a map he stole, and he's informed her that they're moving across the southern part of Texas and that they should be careful. Alice suspects it's not that they need to be careful, but that he's worried about running into "old friends."

Under his request, and much to Alice's surprise, they travel by day under cloud cover and at night, take refuge in old broken down homes and barns. She's curious about his sudden preference for the daylight hours.

"Why the change?" she asks conversationally. "I thought you hated being out in the open during the day."

He stops, turns his head in the direction of the wind. They're in Brownsville, he said earlier; he doesn't have good memories of this place. "I'd rather travel safely during the day than be attacked while travellin' at night. I know you're used to being ignored or looked over up North, Alice, and even in the southeast but... the covens here, they won't ignore us. They're too damn curious for their own good, and they don't like people trespassing on their territory. Even though the war is pretty much over, the fighting isn't. They're brutal bast-... they're brutal."

Alice giggles quietly. "It's okay, Jasper. Don't change your speaking habits because of me. I'm almost certain I've heard worse."

"I'm sure you have," he says, looking at her over his shoulder, "but if my Ma heard me talkin' like that in front of a lady, she'd string me up and beat me. Then she'd get started on me."

She bites her lip to keep from laughing again. She starts to say something witty, but he stops short and sticks his arm out.

She halts and looks around. "What is it?"

"_Shh_."

Alice steps closer to him when he holds his arm out for her, and sniffs delicately. She smells something; another vampire. "Can't we just tell them we're only passing through...?"

"Passing through to where, little lady?"

She feels Jasper tense, and she peeps over his arm. Two males are standing in front of them, and each of them sports identicle red shirts, dark denim trousers and black boots. At closer observation, Alice realises that their clothing isn't the only thing that matches; their dark hair is parted in the same spot, their eyes are the same slanted, almond shape.

They're twins.

"We don't want a fight," Jasper says carefully. "Like she said, we're only passin' through."

The twin on the left leans forward and sniffs at them. Then, he folds his arms and circles around, eyeballing them with interest. "You're from around here... she ain't, though."

"No," Jasper says, turning his head only enough to keep an eye on the taller man. "If that's all, we'll just be on our way."

The other twin, the one who remained stationary, tilts his head to one side and reaches his arm out for Alice. Jasper wraps his arm around her shoulders from behind and pulls her back against him. A low, warning rumble sounds from his chest.

The twins laugh, two identical high-pitched giggles. The one on the left leans over to his brother and mumbles, "His mama never taught him to share."

"She sure didn't." He turns his attention back to Jasper, "That ain't very nice, you know. We're just curious."

"And I've told you," Jasper replies through gritted teeth, "we're passing through. Quietly."

The twins part, forming a small path between them. "Pass through, then."

Alice turns her head and looks up at Jasper. He glances down at her, then places hands hands on her shoulders. He nudges her foreward gently, but doesn't let her walk fast enough to put any space between them. She tries to make herself as small as possible, to squeeze through the tiny gap between the twins without touching them.

Everything happens quickly. She feels herself being jerked forward, feels Jasper's tight grip on her shoulders loosen and slip. She tries to turn, but all she can see is red cloth - one of the twins has her. She gasps, his hands on her arms and shoulders threatening to snap her in two. He's strong - stronger than her.

_Of course he is,_ she realises. _He lives off human blood_.

She squeezes her eyes shut and manages to wiggle her arm free, then sends her elbow flying backwards. Hard. It makes contact with something - a ribcage, maybe - and the man hisses and lets go of her.

She tries to scramble away, but there's a sharp pain in her neck and her head is jerked backwards. She reaches up, feels fingers fisted in her hair. She rushes forward, but she feels a crushing grip on her shoulder and the hand in her hair jerks violently. Her head is snapped backwards again. She shrieks as a loud grinding noise fills her ears, and a white-hot pain shoots through her left shoulder and up the side of her neck.

"Alice!"

If her heart were still beating, she thinks it might've leapt through her chest by her now. She opens her eyes and tries to see something besides trees and arms and leaves and dirt, but she can't. She only knows the moment when she no longer feels the man's grip on her, and she drops to her ground, scrambling away from him in the mud. She holds her shoulder, her eyes darting around wildly. She can't see Jasper at all.

She curses herself mentally, feels absolutely useless; what's the good in having superhuman strength if she can never use it? _This isn't the time for self pity, Alice_. She pulls herself to her feet, and growls viciously as another pair of arms wraps themselves around her. She kicks when her feet come up off the ground, because it hurts her shoulder too much to use her fists.

"Alice - _Alice_, it's me!"

She opens her eyes to find Jasper's face just inches from hers. Fresh wounds in his neck and shoulders catch her gaze - new scars to add to his collection.

"Jasper?"

He sets her back on the ground, and his hands go immediately to her shoulder.

"_Ow!_"

"You've never had to defend yourself before, have you?"

Alice blinks up at him. "...No. I'm sorry."

"Why are you apologising?" he asks as he inspects her arm.

"...I could've got us killed 'cause I dunno what I'm doing," she mumbles. "You shouldn't have to protect you _and_ me."

He doesn't answer. Instead, he places his right hand on her shoulder and wraps the fingers of his left around her wrist. "It's dislocated."

"...Oh."

"It'll hurt."

Alice bites her lip. "Okay."

When he pushes her arm back into the socket, she doesn't cry out; she refuses to look any weaker than she already has in front of him. Instead, she bites through her tongue and takes the pain silently. He kneels and looks at her, inspecting her face carefully. "You okay?"

She nods.

"Sure?"

Nodding again.

"They got away. Ran off," he informs her. "And we need to keep moving. We've gotta go further north and get out of this place. ...If you're feeling up to it, I mean."

"M'fine... we can go."

"Alice, if you want to rest -"

"We can go," she insists. "At least til we find a place to stay."

Jasper eyes her skeptically, but he grabs the bag she dropped during the scuffle and throws it over his shoulder. She follows him as they continue in the direction they were headed, her head down and her hand on her shoulder. Jasper could've died because she wasn't prepared to defend herself.

He could've died trying to protect her.

She makes up her mind then and there that the next time they have to fight, _she'll_ be the one protecting _him_.

* * *

Alice finds an old barn on some abandoned farm land for them to stay in, just as night approaches and rain begins to fall. On the way in, they snatch two small foxes and a bobcat to take in with them. They barricade the door so the animals can't get out, and Alice immediately begins digging in her bag.

She pulls out an old, torn shirt and climbs up the loft. Sticking the shirt out the broken window, she waits until it's soaked with rainwater and then makes her way back to Jasper. Without asking if he minds, she begins dabbing at the healing wounds from the fight with the twins.

"Alice, it's fine..."

"No, it isn't." He sighs, and a feeling of irritation floods her. She pulls her hand away and looks at the ground. "Sorry."

The irritation melts away and is replaced with a sleepy sort of calmness. "It's okay, Alice... I'm just not used to having people take care of me. ...Not like this."

Alice pouts. "I only want to help... we're travelling during the day now, and people will see us. I thought you might wanna avoid being noticed as much as possible and --"

She looks down. He's holding her wrist, guiding her hand with the wet cloth back up to his shoulder. "It's okay," he says again. "Thank you."

"Are you sure? I don't wanna make you uncomfortable or anything and - okay."

He'd flooded her with annoyance again, but it was somehow playful this time. He was picking at her. She smiles slightly and begins dabbing at the dried blood again. She frowns as her eyes travel over the scars; she hasn't seen them this close yet. There are so many that it's difficult for her to find a patch of smooth, untainted skin that's more than an inch across.

"Was it very hard for you? The fighting?"

Jasper's silent.

They haven't spoken much about their past; Alice doesn't seem to have one and Jasper likes to keep his to himself. Alice, however, has been pushing the subject every now and then. She wants to know more about him - she's seen him in her visions, but she wants to hear it from _him_.

"Sometimes," he replies finally in a quiet voice. "Other times it was just... another part of the day, you know?"

Alice doesn't know. She nods, anyway. She uses her hand to brush the mix of water and blood off his skin, and he tenses when he fingertips brush over a particular scar; it's smaller than the others, and it's nestled in the groove where his shoulder meets his neck. This is the one, she knows. This is the first.

Her other hand moves subconsciously to her own neck, her own scar. The one, single scar on her entire body. Jasper tilts his head to the side, away from her hand, and stands. "That's good enough, Alice," he says, taking the wet cloth from her and wiping it briefly over both sides of his neck.

"Sorry," she whispers.

He laughs slightly. "You've gotta quit apologizing for everything."

"...Sorry."

Jasper shakes his head at her, then watches as he reaches out with one arm and snatches one of the small foxes who happened to be slinking by her. She looks at the animal squirming in her hands, then glances up at him briefly before setting it back down on the ground, watching as it scrambles to hide under some old hay.

"D'you want me to go...?" he asks.

Alice sniffs. "Sorry, I've just never had anyone else around when..."

"It's okay," he says, heading for the door. "I'll just give you a few minutes... maybe I can find another bobcat."

She watches as he goes, then sinks to the ground and glares at the fox's glistening eyes that are peeping at her from a dark corner of the barn. She wasn't prepared to feel this way - to feel that Jasper doesn't really want to be there with her. In a manner of three days, she's managed to almost get them killed and upset him more than once.

She prays for a vision - any vision - that will give her a different view. Something to show her that things will get better between them.

She doesn't get one.


	3. In Games & In Love

_Not mine. Just borrowing them, I promise to give them back when I'm done. ^_^_

Because You Loved Me

Part 3/?

_**In Games & In Love**_

Within the next few weeks, traveling only by cloud-covered day, they've made it to the New Mexico/Arizona border. When they stop to rest and Jasper's out hunting, Alice steals a new handful of clothes for each of them. While _she's_ out hunting, she hones her skills and then shows them off to him when they start moving again.

She's proposed a game tonight, and was surprised when he accepted her offer. "If you think you he can," he had taunted.

Alice had simply poked her tongue out at him, opened the door of the semi-decent shack they were staying in, and said, "Ladies first."

Now, she is crouched behind a large bush with little red berries on it, sniffing at the air every few moments. She knows she isn't fast enough, not yet; she'll have to rely on her other strengths. She knows Jasper's a highly trained professional, but she's also discovered that size matters. She, for example, can hide behind this bush and not be seen.

Jasper cannot.

Sighing, Alice sits fully on her rear on the ground. She'd been kneeling, ready to take off at any seconds, but her sense of smell tells her that she has a while to wait. Bored, she begins inspecting the little red berries on the shrub. She's never seen them before. Picking one off, she sniffs at it and makes a face. They're poisonous.

A quiet shuffle to her left catches her attention, and she drops the berry. This is her chance to prove herself, prove she's not a weak little girl and that she can take care of herself. She pulls herself up to a crouching position again, peering through the dark green leaves of the shrub. She sniffs again.

Her eyes rest on a large, old tree about thirty yards from her. _Hello. I know you're in there_. She snaps her head back to the right; another noise. Her prey and her opponent, all within running distance of each other. Her eyes dart between the tree and the area to her right. She's seen the vision... she's waiting for the precise moment...

At the exact second she feels the single raindrop on her wrist, she leaps from behind the bush and takes off through the trees. She listens for him behind her, beside her, but she doesn't hear him. At least, not on the ground...

Diverting her gaze from the path ahead of her, she glances up quickly, just in time to skid to a halt. He drops from a low-lying branch, landing on the ground directly in front of her. Had she not stopped when she did, he'd have landed right on her. She blinks, shaking her head and getting her thoughts back on track, and takes off after him.

How had she not seen that little trick?

"Not fair!" she yells after him, her run slowing steadily to a walk. She folds her arms and listens. Silence. Alice wonders how she could've possibly lost them, then decides she needs to work on her tracking skills. She sniffs at the air, then spins around and ducks quickly behind another shrub.

Peering between the trees, she spots what looks like a small clearing. She can hear water moving, and the footsteps of her prey. Grinning, she picks her way carefully through the trees towards the young elk. Pausing momentarily, she sniffs again. _Perfect_.

She steps over a large tree root, and her legs bend at the knees. She waits, calculating the jump in her head. It has to be flawless... The elk turns it's head, it's back fully facing her. There. She leaps, her arms out. She feels the tips of her fingers brush against the coarse fur and then -

"_OUCH!"_

Alice is on the ground on her back, with her hand on her forehead. Glaring between her fingers, she sees Jasper sitting by the elk - it's lying down with it's neck at an odd angle - leaning back on his hands with his legs crossed. "Hardhead."

She rubs at her head some more. "_You're _the hardhead... I think you might've split my skull," she complains, wincing for effect.

Jasper grins up at her as she crawls towards him, then leans over and kisses her forehead lightly. She thinks that if she could blush, she would. "You're gettin' fast," he says.

"Not fast enough."

He shakes his head and pushes the elk towards her with one foot. "You'll never be happy with yourself, will you, Alice?"

"Maybe," she pouts. "You could've let me win."

"But that's cheating. On your part and mine."

Jasper has a point. Alice pokes her tongue out at him, as she had done earlier, then examines the elk. "He's big, to be so young."

"Well," Jasper says, standing and stretching. "Should be enough to get your fill, then. I better go find one of my own before we head back."

"Jasper..."

He pauses, having already made it halfway across the clearing. "Yes?"

"No sense in having to hunt down another... there's enough here for the both of us. I mean, if you want."

Folding his arms, Jasper studies her carefully. He remembers the incident with the fox; Alice doesn't like feeding with others around. "I don't mind, Alice. It won't take me long to find another."

She pats the ground next to her timidly. "No sense in it. Besides... we gotta learn to share if we're gonna be in each other's lives for, oh, the next eternity or so."

He smiles at her lightly, and makes his way back over.

Alice stares at him for a moment before turning her back. He waits for her to finish - it's only polite, after all - and only then does he take his turn. She waits for him, and then they walk back to their residence for the night at a normal human speed, Alice trailing behind Jasper slightly.

As they approach the small, old blue house, she picks up her pace and hurries to his side. Hesitantly, she reaches out and slips her fingers into his hand. He looks down at her, and she pretends to be interested in nothing but the scenery. When he links his fingers with hers and squeezes them gently, she grins and flops her head over on his arm.

At last, she's starting to feel like they're where they belong. They're together. At last.

* * *

When the sun rises, Alice rolls over on the dusty old bed and stretches. She yawns for effect. Peering out the window, she frowns; not a cloud in the sky. Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, she looks around and frowns. "Jasper?" He's not in the kitchen occupying himself with the entertainment of watching small critters, nor in the family room reading.

She jumps slightly when the front door opens, and forces herself out of defense-mode when she sees that it's him. "You were out in the light?"

"Only a few seconds... I managed to make it back just as the sun was coming up."

"Where'd you go? Why didn't you come get me?"

Jasper frowns. "I didn't wanna disturb your... er, rest."

"Oh," she laughs. "I wasn't resting. Not really."

"I know," he mumbles. "Maria used to..."

Alice blinks at him. She wants him to keep going, to tell her more about this mysterious young woman who made him at least part of the man he is now.

He doesn't, though. Instead, he simply brings his arm out from behind his back. In his hand is a single, large flower. It's a strange blue color, and she's never seen one before. It smells sweet, like honey, and it's petals are long gentle curves. "What's this?" she asks, taking it from him carefully.

"I don't know," he confesses. "I just saw it and thought of you... I don't know if you like blue, or--"

"Jasper, it's _beautiful_."

She steps forward and wraps her arms around his waist, pressing her face into his chest and squeezing him tightly. She's hugged him before, in the diner and once while they were traveling.

It's the first time he hugs her back.


	4. Because The Past Still Matters

_I'm not happy with this chapter... it feels a little slow, but I couldn't bring myself to cut it out completely. I think Jasper and Alice have to have these conversations for their relationship to progress. I tried to jazz it up in the end......... thoughts? =(_

Because You Loved Me

Part 4/?

_**Because The Past Still Matters...**_

"Tell me about her," Alice says a few days later, when they're traveling across a rain-soaked plain just as the sun is setting. She'd been trailing behind Jasper a few steps, admiring the way the light reflected off his skin. When he was like this, she couldn't see the scars as well. Not that she minded them...

"Who?"

She fiddles with the blue flower he'd given her before - it's petals are wilting now, but she doesn't care. She'll keep it until it crumbles away.

"Maria." Jasper is silent, and continues walking, but at a slower pace. Alice hurries to his side and latches herself onto his arm. When she looks up at him, he looks away. She frowns. "You don't have to..."

"There isn't much to say, Alice. She was angry and driven by revenge and nothing stood in her way, or told her she was wrong."

"Not even you?"

Silence again, and Alice knows; yes, he _had_ told her she was wrong, he _had_ stood up to her. Had it been him and him alone? How had Maria reacted? She has so many questions about this mysterious young woman who turned Jasper all those years ago, and she feels almost connected to her in some way. Had it not been for Maria, Alice would not have him now...

"It was often hard for me to be upset with Maria and stay that way. During the first few years of my new life, she told stories to me, stories of her family and all she'd lost. She explained to me why she was doing what she did... whether it was truth or lie, I didn't know. I still don't. Maria was young; just a child, really, and she often acted like one. She threw temper tantrums when she didn't get her way, and though she was one of the most powerful and cunning vampires I've ever met, she was extremely naive. I think that was her downfall, in the end."

Alice chews her lip, and tries to picture a man like Jasper taking orders from a conniving child. She can't. When she catches him looking down at her out of the corner of his eye, she pulls at face at him. "What?"

"Nothing," he says.

"Tell me..."

He sighs. "You remind me of her, in some ways, that's all."

"I do?" Alice is more interested in this conversation now. "Am I a lot like her?"

Jasper's laugh echoes across the field. "No, Alice. You're nothing _like_ her... you just do some of the same things. You both cling to humanity, though she did so because she missed it. You do it because that's all you know."

She kicks a pile of dirt. "I did it to fit in. Now I feel silly, because _you_ never do those things..."

"Alice," he says, stopping and turning to look down at her. "Does it make you happy?"

While she thinks about this, she sits on the ground and crosses her legs. He sits next to her. "It makes me feel like I have something to do. Brushing my teeth, pretending that I'm sleeping, bathing every night - or every night that I can... I guess it's a way to pass the time. I started out just copying other people, but I've developed my own habits now and... yes, I think it does make me happy."

"Then you shouldn't worry about feeling silly."

Jasper stands and offers his hand to her, but she doesn't take it. She simply looks away. "I remember these things..."

"...Remember what things, Alice?"

"Human things. I remember brushing my hair... it was so long and beautiful," she says, her hand going to her now short and choppy hair. "I remember singing and reading. I even remember baking, I remember the _smell_ but I can't remember the taste, and it's so _frustrating_ because I can't remember anything important and--"

He kneels, reaches out to brush the back of his hand against her cheek. "Alice."

"I'm sorry."

"I don't know how to help you, Alice. The only thing I can say - and I know you're not going to like it - is to let it go. The bits of life you remember, the bits of yourself... they're gone now, and you'll never have them back. This is who you are now; this amazing, strong, _beautiful _creature. Embrace it, because if you don't..."

He trails off. He doesn't have to finish because she can simply look at him and know what he was going to say.

_If you don't, you'll end up like me_.

* * *

A few hours before a cloudless sunrise, they break into a barn that hasn't been abandoned. It's the only choice they have. The three horses that are housed there stare at them when they enter, and Alice watches carefully as Jasper leans on the door one of one of their stables. His arm is extended, his palm up to reveal a handful of hay he'd picked up off the ground.

"I don't like horses," she whispers, standing near the barn door.

Jasper chuckles lightly when the animal sniffs at his hand and then eyeballs his face warily. "That's probably because they're about sixty times your size, Alice."

"Do they bite?"

"If they bit you, it'd probably break their teeth off. Come here."

Alice blinks. "No, that's OK."

"Alice, for God's sake, you could take this animal down in naught-point-two-seconds. You'll fight mountain lions with your bare hands, but you won't go near a horse?"

She thinks that _does_ seem a bit silly. Walking towards them carefully, she makes sure to make absolutely no sound with her feet on the ground. Jasper reaches out and wraps his free arm around her shoulders. "Why are you afraid of them?"

"No reason," she mumbles, taking a bit of the hay he's holding out to her.

"There has to be a reason."

Alice fiddles with the hay. She knows what he's doing; there _is_ a reason she's afraid. A reason she can't remember... a reason that must go back to her human life. She closes her eyes, wrinkles her forehead and thinks. He's quiet while she does this, and when she sighs and rests the back of her head on his chest, he kisses the top of her head gently.

"It's okay. I was just trying to help."

"I know. ...I'm afraid of their teeth, so maybe I was bitten. Trying to feed him wrong or something."

She watches as he reaches out and presses his hand down into hers, over the hay she's holding. He does this until she gets the idea, and flattens her fingers. "Keep it that way, and you won't have a problem."

The horse has stepped up to the very edge of the stable door now, and is sniffing at her. She stares up at it, wide-eyed and feeling a little ridiculous that she's afraid of a herbivore. When she feels its lips tickling her palm, she giggles and bounces on her toes, then grabs more hay when her hand is empty.

Alice feeds the horse until it can't eat anymore, and then she moves on to the next. Jasper sits on the ground, leaning back against the barn wall, his eyes following her every move. There's a soft smile on his face, and he laughs a little every time she wrinkles her nose when the horses' mouths first touch her hand.

By the time she reaches the third animal, he's completely engulfed in his thoughts. His mind is racing and it jumps back and forth between past and present. He thinks briefly of Maria, Nettie and Lucy. He thinks of Peter and Charlotte and wonders where they are. A lullaby echoes in his head, his mother's voice distorted and faint; he can barely remember her now. He can't remember his father's face at all, and his sister and brother are simply names tucked away with other memories he's chosen to forget.

He can barely remember his human life - but it's still _there_. He remembers church and, unlike Alice, he can still remember the taste of fresh bread rolls and tender steak. He thinks it's unfair that Alice has none of this to hold onto. Her past matters, he knows... it matters to her and, for some unknown reason, it matters to him.

Whatever the horrible thing was that had happened to her, she had blocked it off and locked it away with no intention of ever finding it again. Someone had hurt her... physically, mentally or both, he doesn't know, but he knows she's in pain because he can feel it.

Alice is in pain, and she doesn't even realise it.

"Jasper, are you alright?"

He jumps slightly. Alice is kneeling in front of him, her golden eyes locked on his face. "Alice?"

"You look like you saw a ghost or something," she says, reaching up and pushing his hair away from his face. "Where did you go just then?"

"Sorry, I was just thinking. I guess you're not the only one who trances out, hmm?"

Alice smiles, and Jasper decides he quite likes the way the corners of her eyes wrinkle when she does this. "Couple of weirdos, we are."

"Speak for yourself."

She looks at him for a long moment before she moves to lay next to him, curling up by his side with her head on his arm. "Do you think they'll like me? The Cullens?"

Jasper leans down and kisses her forehead. "It's impossible to not like you, Alice."

"You like me?"

He chuckles. "Sure."

"I like you, too."

"You _are_ weird."

Alice pinches him playfully, then sighs and snuggles closer to him. She frowns when he tenses and before she can ask what's wrong, he's on his feet and he's dragging her towards the back of the barn. She's about to ask him what's going on, but when she inhales she catches a whiff of something that causes venom to flood her mouth.

"They're coming to check on the horses?"

"Yes. Up there," he says, gesturing to the rafters. He jumps up after her, and they crouch in a dark corner of the loft together. Alice holds her breath when the door opens, and two young boys hurry through. They're laughing loudly, chatting about something that must have happened in the house.

She watches them until a sharp pain shoots through her wrist from her hand, and up the length of her arm. She looks down; Jasper's grip is so tight on her fingers that she things her arm might pop off. She twists around to look up at him. His eyes, which had been diluted to an almost dark pinkish color due to his new diet, were black. They glistened as he watched the boys move around the barn, and his jaw was set tightly.

"Jasper," she whispers. "Look at me."

He doesn't.

Alice begins to panic. She'd stopped him from killing humans before, but it had been at night and in some kind of privacy. Not like this, in the middle of the morning with two young children to witness them.

"Jasper," she hisses again, grasping his face in her hands. "They'll be gone in a few minutes."

He's still not looking at her; his eyes are locked on the youngest boy, who has come to feed the horse that is closest to them. Alice looks over her shoulder at the boy; he's _so_ close. She allows herself a single breath; one mouthwatering smell. Then, she squeezes her eyes shut and wraps her arms around Jasper's neck, as though embracing him.

She's really just preparing herself to hold him back.

Planting her feet as best as she can in her position, she squeezes him tightly when she feels him tense against her. "Jasper, think about it. They're children; they have a mother and father. You don't want to be responsible for that, do you?"

Her whisper is so quiet and so fast that the boy, even as close as he is, couldn't possibly _hope _to hear her. He does, though, notice their footprints on the ground.

"Mom and dad come out here earlier?" she hears him ask his brother.

"No, why?"

"Someone's been in here."

"Nothing's missing."

Alice feels Jasper tense again, and she gasps when she feels him wrap his arms tightly around her. She wasn't expecting it, and his grip is overwhelming. More surprising than this unexpected action, she thinks, is _why_; he isn't trying to get away from her. He's holding her as though she were a lifeline.

A lifeline for the two boys in the barn.

"It's okay," she whispers. She can feel his anxiety, his hunger; his gift has been left unguarded, and his emotions are crashing over her like a tidalwave. She squeezes her eyes shut again and buries her face in Jasper's shoulder.

"We should tell dad," one of the boys says.

"But they didn't take anything. The horses are still here, and all the tools."

"Still."

Alice hears them walking, hears their retreating footsteps and when the barn door closes she barely has time to get out of the way before Jasper drops to the ground. She hurries after him. "Jasper?"

"We have to go," he says shortly.

"Jasper..."

"Not now, Alice."

She sighs. "I just wanted to say you did good..."

Jasper stops and looks at her, his eyes dark and empty. She knows that look. _Yes_, he's saying. _Maybe this time._


	5. Our Own Novel

_Not mine, and all that yada yada. Don't sue me, please._

_Also – one of you requested a oneshot about Jasper and Alice in the diner... I've lost the email and failed to write your screen name down. Who was it? * searches with flashlight *_

Because You Loved Me

Part 5/?

_**Our Own Novel...**_

They're lost. Jasper knows it, and Alice knows that he knows. The problem is that Alice won't admit it. She says they're just between visions of the Cullens right now; they're exactly where they need to be. Jasper thinks she's just being stubborn.

Their journey has brought them to a field, with snow as far as Jasper can see. A flat, long field of white _nothingness. _"Alice, we're lost."

"We aren't lost," she insists.

When the snow gets so deep that every step Alice takes buries her almost to her chin, Jasper carries her on his back. "We aren't lost," she hisses in his ear. He agrees because he doesn't want to argue. They walk for two days; forty-eight hours straight, because the cloud cover allows it, and even if it didn't there was no one else around to see them, anyway.

On the third day, Jasper decides to put his foot down. He likes Alice – maybe even more- and he knows that if it weren't for her he'd probably be dead or worse by now... but he can't take it any longer. When he inhales deeply out of irritation, he catches a scent. A familiar scent.

Their own scent.

He looks down at the ground, a few hundred yards across from where they're standing now and he sees it: a set of footprints in the shape of his own boots. Next to them was a tiny path, almost like a tunnel, where Alice had shoveled her way through the snow.

"We're going in circles," he growls.

Alice blinks at the prints on the ground, then scrambles off his back and goes to inspect them closer. She stands there for a long time with her back to him and her head down, her arms folded and her nose wrinkled.

Sighing, Jasper flops onto the ground and sits there. "I'm not taking another step, Alice. Not until we find out where the hell we are."

She sniffs affectedly and taps her foot on the snow. "We're not lost..."

He scoffs.

Upon hearing the snow crunch under her flats, he looks up. She's standing in front of him with her hands folded in front of her and her eyes on her feet, like a scolded child. She sniffs again, and again, and Jasper stands quickly.

The sadness and shame coming from her is enough to make him forget why he was upset in the first place. "Oh, Alice... I'm sorry, darlin', I didn't mean it..."

"No," she says in a high-pitched and slightly panicked tone. "We're lost. We're lost, Jasper!" She takes his hands in her own tiny ones, and looks at him with wide and wild eyes. "I've been lying to you; I haven't had a vision of the Cullens since we left _Minnesota_."

...They left Minnesota over a month ago.

"Alice... it's alright. It's fine, maybe we're just not meant to find them right now."

A tiny, quivering mumble escapes her and he immediately leans down and wraps his arms around her shoulders. Lifting her up off the ground, he pats her back gently as she hangs there limp in his arms like a doll, her feet dangling near his knees. "But we're _lost, _and I _lied_ to you! I'm so, so sorry, Jasper."

"I understand why you lied, Alice. It's okay, really. I'm not even upset, see?"

He tries to flood her with something – anything other than the irritation and annoyance that he's really feeling. She could have just _told_ him she wasn't seeing anything...

"You hate me!"

His eyes fly open. "I do _not_ hate you, Alice. Stop that, right now. You made a mistake. God knows I've made my share. Besides, what good would it do for me to be upset?"

"You're gonna leave, aren't you? I'm such a joke."

Jasper sets her down and kneels to be eye-level with her. He studies her face carefully; her sad, golden eyes – oh, how he's come to love those eyes...- her bottom lip, poking out in a very human pout, her delicate eyebrows drawn together. Reaching up, he brushes the back of his hand against her porcelain cheek.

"...Alice, where am I gonna go?"

She sniffs once more and looks up at him from underneath her dark lashes. "Anywhere you want."

"And do what? Go back to the way I was? Alice... you don't know what you've done for me, do you? I'm _happy_. D'you know how long it's been since I've been able to truthfully say that? Even here, in wherever we are, I am _happy_."

"How can you be happy when we're running in circles, Jasper? For a month, I've been leading a wild goose chase."

"I may be on a goose chase," he whispers, taking her hands and pulling her closer to him, "but I'm on it with _you._"

Alice blinks rapidly, stares at him. "What?"

"You make me happy, Alice. It doesn't matter if we're lost in a tundra or wandering around in a desert or... fighting over who's faster. As long as I can look to my left or right and see you, I don't care."

She bites her bottom lip.

"When I first met you in that diner and you started rambling about seeing the future and that we're meant to be together, I thought you'd escaped from a nut house or something..."

She thinks that doesn't sound so far fetched...

"But I trusted you because of the way you made me feel."

"Thank you, Jasper," she says, rubbing at her eyes with the back of her hand. "You make me happy, too. ...Let's keep moving, okay?"

Alice starts to turn away, to circle around and climb up onto his back again, but he catches her wrist and when he tugs on her, she turns her head at just right angle to catch the very corner of his lips with her own.

Her eyes fly open and they meet with his; a dark, deep amber with just the hint of a pinkish hue. She blinks, but she doesn't pull away and she doesn't shut her eyes. She thinks they must've sat there like that for hours – him on knees, with one hand on her wrist and the other on her shoulder, and her with her head bent down and her hands resting on the sides of his neck.

Unmoving, unblinking. Two statues that could've been linked together that way, even in first flurries of an oncoming storm, for the rest of eternity.

She would've liked that.

Jasper pulls away (_too soon_, she thinks, _kiss me again_), and stands. She takes the hand he offers, linking her fingers with his in a grip that would've crushed the bones of any human, and they walk on in silence.

There were no words needed, not this time.

At last – in a mix of snow and wind so thick that even their enhanced vision is nearly useless - they come across a patch of land that doesn't smell familiar to either one of them. Jasper's hesitant at first, thinks something isn't quite right, but she urges him on.

Alice is about to quite literally jump for joy at finally getting out of their repeated circle, but before she can finish her first "yay!", Jasper grabs her and pulls her close.

"Hush," he hisses.

She clings to his arm and closes her mouth. She's learned now; when Jasper tells her to be quiet, it's for good reason. She waits, turning with him as he squints in the snow and she's about to ask him what the problem is when she hears a loud, almost deafening, crack.

Alice feels as though the ground is moving, but she isn't. Caught unprepared, her feet slide beneath her and she lands hard on her bottom, feeling Jasper's arm slip from her hands.

"_Jasper!_"

She gasps when she's slapped in the face with something cold, and extremely wet.

Water.

Kicking her feet, she gathers her bearings and looks around; they'd been walking on a ground made of ice. The ground had broken. Reaching up out of the freezing water, she digs her fingers into a patch of hard snow... she thinks _this_ ground appears to be safe; perhaps there's actual earth underneath it.

She pulls herself out of the water, and her eyes immediately begin searching frantically. "Jasper?!"

Nothing. Ice and loud, rushing water, snow and howling wind. _Nothing_.

Alice stands, ignoring the frost that's beginning to form on her hands and face – she can't feel the cold, and even if she could, she wouldn't care. There's another loud cracking sound, and her head snaps around to the direction it came from.

There. She sees something in the water, something blue. His coat. Taking off in a sprint, she dances over the frozen lake and across the floating rafts of ice; a tiny blur in the storm. Skidding to a halt, she plunges her arm into the rushing water just in time to grab his collar. She jerks upwards, hard and yelps when she feels herself flying backwards.

Her head makes contact with something hard, and it hurts a little, but she decides to complain later. "Hi," she gasps.

With the force of sheer strength, she's yanked Jasper out of the water and he'd landed almost directly on top of her. "...Hi. I just couldn't get a--"

"Don't make excuses because you can't swim," she teases.

"I had it handled."

"Yes, you were doing a _wonderful_ job, Major."

He glares down at her, then his expression softens. "When we find this family we're looking for... don't tell them you had to save me from the water. Please."

Alice grins. "Not a word from me. ...But you really should learn to swim."

* * *

The storm's passed now, and they're lying out in the open on top of a fresh patch of snow. Alice is picking icicles out of Jasper's hair.

"Thank you, Alice. For earlier. I know I wouldn't have drowned, but..."

She frowns down at him. "But?"

"I was scared," he mumbles. "I nearly drowned once as a kid, and though I know it can't happen now... I was taken back to that moment."

"What happened?" she whispers, feeling bad for teasing him about not being able to swim.

"I had a friend called Dallas when I was a kid; we were inseparable. Anyway, in the summer after all the work was done, we used to go this river. There was a tree there that we liked to climb. The summer I turned twelve, I think, it had flooded. I stepped on a dead branch, the current was too strong... you know. Dallas saved me..."

Alice stares at him, and wonders what would've happened if his friend had not been there. Where would _she_ be right now? Would she even be alive?

What happens when one's soulmate dies...?

"Beautiful," he whispers.

She frowns and blinks. "What?"

He nods his head upwards, and for one bizarre moment, she thinks he's gesturing to her. But when he reaches up and, with one finger under her chin, gently turns her head, she sees what he really means. "Aurora Borealis," she whispers. "The Northern Lights."

"Have you been here before?"

"No," she explains, "but I've read about them. I've always wanted to see them, and now..."

Jasper is silent as he waits for her to finish her sentence, and when she doesn't continue, he sits up and looks at her. "And now...?"

"Seems kinda trivial," she mumbles. "Before I realized I was gonna live forever, I thought, 'That's a once in a lifetime kinda thing...,' you know?"

He makes a _hmm_ noise in agreement.

"But now I think about it, I can come here any time. Tomorrow, next month, next year... next century. Something else is more important to me than seeing all these strange things, now. These past few months, instead of wondering where I'm gonna travel next, I find myself wondering what would've happened to me if I hadn't had my visions of you? If I'd been born a year later, or earlier... would I still be sitting here with you right now?"

Silence.

Because he's thinking the same thing. What if he hadn't left when he did? What if he hadn't found this confusing little creature?

"I used to read these romance novels and think that I'd like to have that. Some big, strong flawless man to sweep me off my feet and..." she trails off, then sighs. "And I found you. This troubled, scarred man with a past he doesn't like to talk about... and it's _so _much better, Jasper. It's more than what those silly girls get in those books. It's _real_, and it's mine and I don't want _anything_ else in the world."

Jasper watches her closely as she sits up on her knees and wraps her arms around his neck carefully. Then, after a moment of caution, she leans forward and places a single kiss on his cheek.

_I love you_. He tenses, and she pulls away. Had she done something wrong? No... she'd spoken out loud. "I'm sorry, I--"

She stops, because the tip of his finger is on her lips. They sit there for a long moment, his eyebrows drawn together and his mouth open slightly, as though he's trying to form words but can't quite get them right in his head first.

Alice realizes the feelings of confusion and uncertainty are not coming from her...

"You don't have to say it back, Jasper."

"But I do," he says quickly. "It's just, I've never _said_ it, and I'm not really sure how to..."

She smiles at him and leans forward to rest her head on his shoulder. "Because you're not ready."

Disappointment. "I'm sorry. But I do, Alice."

"I know."

And she _does_ know. She knows because she can _feel_ it... and that, she thinks, is worth more than hearing three tiny words.


	6. All In The Family

_I just want to take a minute to thank everyone who has been reading this series. Your reviews inspire me to keep going. If you haven't done so yet, be sure to check out the companion fics to this, About A Soldier (Jasper's story) and Pixie Dust & Premonitions (Alice's story) which can be found here on my profile. ^_^_

Because You Loved Me

Part 6/?

_**All In The Family...**_

It's been two months since they were lost together in that blizzard. Two months since their first (and so far, their only) kiss. Two months since Alice had the vision of the house at the end of the road....

_I'm nervous_, she'd said. _What if they don't like me_?

She'd gotten over that soon enough.

"...And so here we are!"

The large grin on Alice's face slowly dissolves when her story of how she sees the future, found Jasper and then spent two years searching for the Cullens is met with nothing but silence and blank stares. They found the family in a tiny Wisconsin town, having luckily arrived during a nightly thunderstorm.

The house - two story and made of light colored stones, with a balcony that ran along the second floor - was about a twenty minute walk at human speed off the main road away from the town; just far enough away from the human population. Alice had mentioned a family of five, yet only three stood before them.

And all of their golden eyes were fixed on him. No, not him... his scars and his eyes. He'd slipped up a few weeks ago, and Alice hadn't been quick enough to stop him. His eyes were still proof that his willpower wasn't as strong as he'd like it to be...

Jasper feels Alice's grip on his hand tighten. "Um..." she was desperate. "Y-you're Doctor Cullen, right?"

"Yes, that's right," the man says, tearing his eyes away from Jasper to look down at Alice. "This is--"

"Esme and Rosalie," Alice pipes with excitement. She bounces on her toes and then frowns. "...Edward and Emmett, they're not here? Oh, I'm sorry, I'm doing it again. I don't mean to."

"That's alright, sweetheart," Esme says, laughing lightly. "I think you have a wonderful gift. Isn't that right, Carlisle?"

"I don't buy it," Rosalie snaps, throwing her long blonde hair over her shoulder. "How do we know they're telling the truth?"

Carlisle gives her a warning look. "We're always open to new members of the family, Rosalie, you know that. Anyone who wants to join us and put forth the effort."

"Well, _one _of them is." Alice frowns as Rosalie turns her gaze back to Jasper and curls her lip at him. "What happened to you, anyway?"

"Rosalie!" Esme places a hand on her shoulder. "Forgive her, she's just not as trusting as the rest of us..."

"H-he's trying," Alice says quickly. "He's done really well, and a few weeks ago is the first time he's slipped up in a really long time. He wants to do this, it's just hard for him. ...Right, Jasper?"

Carlisle turns to look at Jasper again, and he decides he doesn't like it when the man makes eye contact. It feels as though he's staring right through him...

"Is that right, son?"

Jasper looks at the ground. "Yes, sir."

"Well, then!" Esme exclaims. "I see nothing wrong with giving someone a chance."

Alice bounces again. "Which room can we have?"

Folding her arms, Rosalie curls her lip again. "Not _mine_."

"Don't worry," Esme says, wrapping an arm around Alice's shoulders as Rosalie turns away and stomps back into the house. "She'll warm up to you."

Alice sniffs affectedly and poked out her bottom lip. "I know."

The room at the end of the second floor hallway on the left is the one Alice falls in love with. It overlooks the back yard, and the Big Dipper constellation sits directly over the balcony. The only problem, Jasper realizes, is that it's already taken.

"But this is _Edward's_ room," Rosalie insists. "You can't just _kick_ him out."

"He won't mind, Rose," Carlisle says, lifting a large brown armchair off the floor. "Besides, he's been wanting to change rooms, anyway. We can help him when he and Emmett return."

Jasper takes the chair from Carlisle, "We don't have to take this one, sir... Alice just sort of doesn't think about these things and--"

"It's alright. If this is the room the two of you want, you can certainly have it. Edward won't object."

He feels uncomfortable taking the kid's room, but Carlisle wasn't backing down. Neither was Alice. "I could put a bed here," she was rattling to Esme while they stood in front of a blank wall, her arms outstretched in front of her for emphasis. "I like to lie down sometimes, you know. Oh, and a little loveseat here! It'll be perfect for looking out the window. And --"

Jasper shakes his head and follows Carlisle to the basement. They make several trips back and forth, moving furniture and stacking carefully. On their last trip, Carlisle stops him as he's about to walk back up the stairs. "Jasper..."

"Sir?"

"This is a very tight knit family. I hope you understand that."

He frowns, not quite certain what Carlisle is getting at. "I do, sir..."

"I have no doubt at all that you'll put a hundred percent into your effort to control your diet, Jasper, so don't take this the wrong way. I just want you to know that I'm going to be keeping a _very_ close watch on you. ...Slipping up is something we can't afford. I'd never turn you away or kick you out of the family as long as you want to be here, but I have to see that this is _really_ where you want to be."

"...I'm here for Alice, sir. No more reason, and no less. She wants to be here, and I'll do nothing to jeopardize her future here. She's looked for this family for almost thirty years."

A soft smile crosses Carlisle's face. "And do _you _want to be here?"

"I want to be where Alice is."

Jasper tenses when Carlisle drapes his arm around his shoulders. "Then I have no doubts about you... I get a feeling that you two need each other."

He does need Alice; he's not afraid to admit that. However, he's not quite sure if Alice really needs him...

"I guess you could say that, sir."

* * *

"What do you think?" Alice asks later, about three in morning. Jasper turns away from the window and surveys the room. It's bare, completely empty, except for a small two-seater sofa that Esme moved up from the family room. "I'll get furniture," she promises. "Maybe a bookshelf or two, and --"

"And when we have to move?"

Alice bites her lip. "It won't be all that hard," she says. "They move like real people, Esme says. Pack everything up and rent a moving van."

He scowls. They have to do things the hard way, don't they? "I see."

"...What do you think about the family?"

"I think the kid'll be pretty pissed off when he finds out we took his room."

"I mean in _general_, Jasper."

He thinks about this carefully before answering. "They're nice. I've never really had a family before, Alice, so I'm not sure what to think. I'm glad we found them, though, if that's what you're asking."

Alice folds her legs underneath her and sighs. "I think Rosalie doesn't like me very much."

"I think Rosalie doesn't like _anyone_ very much, Alice."

"I heard her telling Esme I'm too short, that I must've been stunted or something. ...I wonder, why _am_ I so short?" She sighs again. "She's so _beautiful_. I mean, I saw her in my visions but I never --"

"Matter of opinion."

"What?"

Jasper crosses the room and lowers himself onto the sofa next to Alice. "I said that's a matter of opinion. She's no more beautiful than anyone else I've ever seen."

"What are you, blind?"

He smiles slightly. "Maybe." Alice scowls, but her expression softens when he leans over and kisses the top of her head gently. "But if I am, it's all your fault."

Alice is glad she can't blush. "I'm not all that great, Jasper."

"Matter of opinion," he repeats.

She leans over on his shoulder and sighs, because she knows she's not going to win this argument.

Three hours later, she's startled to her feet by a large crash and the sound of breaking glass downstairs. She realizes that she's alone in the room. Her feet barely touch the ground between the sofa and the door, and she practically flies down the stairs, skipping three steps at a time.

She stops abruptly, skidding a ways on the oriental rug in the entrance hall. "Jasper!"

Her eyes dart between the three men wildly. She recognizes two of them immediately from her visions and she knows that Edward and Emmett have returned from their hunting trip. It's not the introduction she'd imagined. The long tan sofa is overturned, and the lamp next to it lies shattered on the floor.

The bigger man, Emmett, has Jasper by the collar of his coat. Jasper's feet are dangling inches above the ground and behind him on the wall there is a dent that, oddly enough, is an almost perfect outline of his frame. Edward is trying in vain to pull Emmett away.

"No, no, _no_!" Alice cries and hurries over. She wraps her hands around one of Emmett's arms and pulls, but due to his sheer amount of strength, he shakes her off with a simple flick of his wrist. She squeezes her eyes closed as the glass coffee table rushes towards her face, and she hears it shatter when he head makes contact with it.

"_**Everybody **__**stop**_!"

There's a whirl of commotion, and by the time Alice is on her feet again Carlisle and Edward are restraining Emmett, who is growling and snapping his teeth viciously. Esme is standing in front of Jasper with her hands on his chest and Rosalie is standing in the middle of them, her hands on her hips and her eyes flaming with rage.

Alice pouts and rubs her head.

"I caught _him_ sneaking in!" Emmett yells, pointing an accusing finger at Jasper.

Edward rolls his eyes and straightens his shirt, "If you'd listen to me--"

"He wasn't sneaking in, you great idiot!" Rosalie shrieks. "You could've gotten _killed_, Emmett Cullen!"

Emmett blinks at her. "He wasn't?"

"Like I was saying --"

Edward is interrupted again by Carlisle. "Emmett... Jasper and Alice have joined our family."

"Alice?"

Alice waves at him sheepishly, "That's me. Hi."

Realization hits Emmett, and the look on his face is suddenly extremely apologetic. "I didn't know, man. I thought you were... well, look at you."

Jasper's lip curls and Alice hurries over to him. "He didn't mean it that way, Jasper."

"No, clearly not."

Emmett holds his hands up, "Sorry. No offense intended... s'just. Wow, you two are quite a sight, aren't you?"

Alice looks up at Jasper, then back at Emmett, and then down at herself. "We are?"

"What are you, a leprechaun?"

A rumbling growl is the response.

"_Jasper_. No, I am not a leprechaun. I'm just... a short person."

"You mean like a midget?"

Carlisle rubs at his temples. "Emmett, you're really not helping the situation at all, you do realize this?"

"Yes, Emmett," Rosalie hisses. "Do shut up."

"I'm sorry," he says, stepping forward and cautiously extending his hand to Jasper. "Start over? Emmett Cullen."

Jasper looks down at Emmett's hand, then up at his face. Slowly, he reaches out to him. "Jasper..."

"Just Jasper?"

"For now," Esme informs him. "We haven't gotten that far yet; they only just arrived this evening."

"And... you're Edward," Alice says.

"Yes, I am. Don't worry about the room."

Alice blinks, and Rosalie rolls her eyes. "He has a habit of reading people's minds without permission."

"Yes," Edward says, "and I'd appreciate it if you keep your apprehensive thoughts to yourself, Rosalie."

"He tried to kill my _husband_. No, no, Esme! It's fine. Perfectly fine. I'm fine. See? No temper issues here. _Come on, Emmett_."

Emmett scrambles to Rosalie's side immediately. "Sorry. ...Sorry, she's just--"

"We know," Esme says, shooing them away with a wave of her hand. "Best if you go."

Carlisle takes a long, deep breath and runs a hand through his hair. Then, he look to Edward. "...Stuffs in the basement."

"That's fine."

"I'll help you move it," Jasper offers. "Since we're the reason it's there in the first place."

Edward shakes his head, "No, it's alright. I can manage. ...Best to just stay out of Rosalie's way for a few...hundred years."

Alice frowns after him as he disappears to the basement, followed by Carlisle. Esme folds her hands and sighs. The three of them stand there in silence for a few moments before she speaks. "_Well_..."

"I'm sorry," Jasper says quietly.

"Oh, it isn't your fault, my dear," Esme says, patting his shoulder lightly. "Emmett tends to act before he... well, he never really gets to the thinking part, but he's harmless, really. Unless he needs to protect Rosalie, then I'd make a point to get out of the country..."

Alice shares a laugh with Esme, and Jasper cracks a very slight smile. "I'll keep that in mind."

"Tomorrow's another day. Goodnight... figuratively speaking. Maybe we'll all start over tomorrow."

They watch her disappear, and Alice sighs. "Jasper... no one blames you. You were just defending yourself." He doesn't answer, so she takes his hand and tugs him towards the stairs.

They curl up on the two-seater, Alice with her face pressed into Jasper's shoulder and Jasper with his head leaning back on the wall behind them. He's tense again, more so than he has been in almost an entire year, and Alice worries that maybe she made a mistake bringing him here. Maybe she made a mistake forcing him into a life that he's honestly not committed to.

Maybe she made a mistake.


	7. Bonding & Visions

_**Dosclaimer: **Not mine. Still. Sadly..._

Because You Loved Me

Part 7/?

_Alice Cullen._

_A.C._

_Alice C._

_Cullen. Alice Cullen._

"What are you doing?"

Alice closes the sketchpad quickly, dropping the pencil and folds her hands on the table innocently. "Nothing."

Esme grins down at her, arching a perfect eyebrow knowingly. "Trying out the new name?" she asks, sitting at the table and folding her arms in reflection of Alice's action.

It's been three days since their arrival.

"Yes. I quite like it..."

"Carlisle thought that since Jasper and Rosalie look so much alike, he could take her name. We spoke with her and, well, she isn't happy but she will get over it."

Alice fiddles with the corner of the sketchpad. "But Jasper already has a name. It's Whitlock. I only needed one 'cause I couldn't remember mine..."

Esme reaches out and places her hand over Alice's and pats it gently. "Alice, honey... we know Jasper has a name, and we have no intention of taking it from him. However, if we're going to appear to be a family, we must all present ourselves as relations in some way. Now that the family has grown from just Carlisle, Edward and myself, we've taken on the position of a husband and wife who adopt. Edward and Emmett Cullen - and now you, Alice Cullen - are all our adoptive children. We let Rosalie - who poses as a child from another family - keep her last name because of Emmett. They're together, in case you haven't noticed, and if they had the same last name, that would not work too well, would it?"

"So... you want Jasper to be your son, but you want us to still be able to be... together? Alice Cullen and Jasper Hale..."

"That's exactly my point, dear. It's easier for all of us that way, but... perhaps _you_ should speak with him? He may be more open to the idea if he hears it from you."

Alice nods. "I'll tell him."

"Wonderful, but first... I wonder, would you like to go shopping with Rosalie and me? I noticed you only have one bag of clothes. Carlisle suggested we could get some furniture for your room, as well. You mentioned wanting a bed."

Shopping? Real shopping? "I'd love that, Esme! Oh... I need to get Jasper some things, too."

"Of course; we'll get you both enough to start a new wardrobe. I suspect he's roughly Edward's size, if not a little bigger. If there's a problem, we can always exchange."

"Will he be okay here? I mean, with Carlisle and Edward and Emmett..."

"Why wouldn't he be," Rosalie asks, floating swiftly down the stairs. "He can obviously take care of himself."

"Now, Rose..." Esme warns. "Remember what we spoke about."

Rosalie leans back against the counter and folds her arms, peering at Alice from behind her blonde fringe. Then, she sighs dramatically and says in a monotone drone, "Alice and Jasper are family now, and we're going to treat them that way and make absolutely certain that they feel welcome in every way, shape and form, and if I have a problem with that, I will voice it in an appropriate manner so that we can discuss it - as a family - and get the issue resolved."

Alice blinks, and Esme rubs at her forehead. "Yes, that's... word for word what we spoke about, Rosalie."

"You asked."

"She is your sister now, Rosalie, perhaps you should _speak_ to her."

"...Hello, Alice."

"Hi, Rosalie. Your hair looks nice today."

"I know."

Alice sniffs and looks at the table. Esme makes a slightly exasperated noise and runs a hand over her face. "Well, now that that's taken care of... I thought we could go clothes shopping first."

"I certainly hope so," Rosalie says. "She can't go furniture shopping in _that_. I'll be in the car."

When she's gone, Alice can no longer ignore the belittled feeling in the pit of her stomach. "Esme..."

"She's not always this bad, Alice. Something you have to understand about Rosalie is that in her human life, she was an extremely materialistic girl. She's used to being beautiful, she's used to being the center of attention. The best thing to do is not take anything she says too seriously. When she tries, she's a wonderful person."

"Okay, Esme. I'll try..."

* * *

It was harder for Alice to leave Jasper at the house than she thought it would. She could feel anxiety from him - a firm sort of uncomfortable feeling at being separated from her. Ever since the moment they met, they hadn't been apart for more than an hour. Alice would be gone all day.

They took Esme's car to the shopping center, and Alice was gripping the seat beneath her for the entire ride. Esme tried to describe her by asking about how she and Jasper met, so she told the story of how she had visions and followed them. Rosalie stayed silent in the back seat.

When they arrived, Alice trotted to keep up with Esme and Rosalie's long strides - even at human speed, they were fast. The heels of their designer shoes make a rhythmic, almost deep and sophisticated sound on the marble floor as they made their way through the building.

Alice's flats squeak at various volumes as she tags along behind them.

"You shop _here_?"

"Quit gawking," Rosalie says lowly over her shoulder.

"Be _nice_. Alice, I thought we'd start in a simple store first. Then we'll work our way up to formal wear. Rosalie... you're the best here with cosmetics and accessories. Would you...?"

"I thought you'd never ask. I can't wait to get my hands on that hair."

Alice's fingers reach up to feel her short tresses subconsciously as she watches Rosalie disappear in the mass of people, her blonde curls bouncing with each step she takes. "My hair?"

"It's short, honey, but leave it to Rosalie; she can do _anything_ when it comes to appearance. Now, you look like a size two or three... come on. I know the perfect place."

They circled the store three times, and Alice tried on six blouses, four pairs of trousers and two pair of ballet flats. She liked them all. Esme had told her to wait there while she took care of everything, and Alice had begun to admire a diamond bracelet on display on top of a glass counter.

She wanted it.

"Alice, no!"

Jumping slightly, she turns around and finds Esme hurrying towards her. She looks like a deer caught in headlights, with the diamond bracelet half hidden in her palm. "Esme?"

"Honey," she says, reaching out and prying the bracelet from Alice's hand. "We don't have to _steal_... oh, goodness, if someone had seen you..."

"We don't?"

"_No_, darling, we... oh." Esme holds her head in her hands, "Alice, Carlisle gets paid for his work as a doctor and I get paid at the museum... we buy our things properly."

Alice looks at her shoes. A feeling of shame like she's never felt before washes over her. "I am so sorry, Esme... it's just... habit... I didn't know, I-I..."

"It's okay, Alice. Really, I should've told you. I just assumed... oh." The woman sighs deeply. "Do you want the bracelet?"

"I do like it..."

Esme pushes the bracelet back into Alice's hand, then motions for her to follow. "I'll show you how to pay."

"Back already, Mrs. Cullen?" the girl behind the counter said with a smile. "Oh, is this the new daughter you spoke of?"

"Yes, this is Alice. She just turned sixteen, as I said before. It's too bad her last family didn't work out; it's so hard moving homes when you're as old as she is. This is a spree for her birthday and she's decided she likes this bracelet, as well."

Alice watches carefully as the girl scans the little plastic tag on the bracelet, and blinks slightly when the machine in front of her makes a loud beeping noise. "One hundred and fifty-seven dollars, and sixteen cents, please."

"Here, sweetheart. Take this cash... go on," She holds out her hands and stares as Esme pushes money into her hands. "It's quite easy, really... she's just learning," she says when the girl behind the counter shifts uncomfortably.

As Esme counts out the money, taking bill by bill and coin by coin from Alice's hand, she puts this process down to memory. In a few short moments, the bracelet is around her wrist. "Is it always that complicated?"

"No... there are credit cards. You'll probably fair well with those. It's a simple swipe-and-button process. We'll talk to Carlisle."

"I'm sorry I don't know these things, Esme..."

"It's expected, Alice. You didn't even remember your own name, how are you to remember how to count change?"

"What's in _there_, Rosalie?"

Halfway through the day, Esme and Rosalie switched Alice-sitting duties. Esme wanted to pick out a few things for Carlisle and herself, so Alice was ordered to go with her sister. Sister... it was strange to think she had one, in a sense.

Alice had paused in front of a window in which the mannequin wore nothing but two, teensy pieces of red lace. Rosalie smirks. "Lingerie," she says. "No self-respecting girl should be without it. You wanna go in?"

"Oh," Alice looks down at herself. "I-I don't think anything in there would fit me..."

It was true; the store looked like it was filled with pieces made specifically for a body like Rosalie's. Not _hers_. "Sure it will. You have a nice figure, you know... now that I can _see_ it, instead of it being hidden beneath an old baggy potato sack."

Before taking her any further once Esme left, Rosalie had insisted that she change into one of the new outfits she'd bought. They used a bathroom stall to switch clothing, and once she was satisfied, Rosalie used some of the new product in her hair.

"Rose, really, I-I don't..."

"At least do it for Jasper. The man looks like he could use a surprise... come on." Alice couldn't protest before Rosalie was dragging her into the lingerie store.

"What do you mean, _for Jasper_?"

"Well, what do you think I mean? My Lord, girl." Alice stares at her, and only after a very long moment does Rosalie realize that the topic of conversation is truly a mystery to the girl. "...You mean you don't... you haven't..."

Alice blinks innocently.

"Oh, my. Um... wow, Alice, sorry. I just assumed you two were like, _together_."

"We are... I don't understand, Rosalie."

"You will," the blonde says, her expression softening considerably. "Trust me... give it some time. You'll know _exactly_ what I mean. Still, we'll get a few things from here. You need some fancy undergarments, anyway. Makes a girl feel sexy."

Alice raises her eyebrows, and follows Rosalie to the petite section of the store. She and Jasper are together, she knows. She _thinks_. He's kissed her once, and he often holds her hand and hugs her. What "together" had Rosalie meant? ...She decides to ask Esme later.

* * *

"_Oh_," Alice says. "..._Oh_."

She and Esme are sitting at the kitchen table. The rest of the family were out hunting; the two of them had returned early. Alice had wanted to wait for Jasper, but Edward insisted that coming back to the house before him would be perfectly fine, that it was healthy to spend some time apart.

So, she had. She had also mentioned Rosalie's earlier cryptic words. Esme had explained.

"No... we... no. He hasn't even really told me he loves me. I know he _does_, it's just a hard thing for him to say..."

Esme nods. "I understand, sweetheart. From what I've heard of his past, I don't blame him. The time will come, Alice... you'll see. For him to say it to you, and to show you."

Alice picks at the edge of the table, and she starts to say something but the front door swings open and Carlisle, Edward, Emmett and Rosalie rush through the front door. Emmett is carrying Rosalie bridal-style, and Edward and Carlisle are laughing loudly about something. Esme smiles and stands to greet them, but Alice stays where she is.

"...Where is Jasper?"

Carlisle frowns. "Well, I thought he was coming back to the house..."

Alice stands, and gives him a look that says, clearly, he isn't here. Emmett sets Rosalie down. "...Did he say he was?"

"No, but--"

"_Oh..._" Alice pushes through her family members and rushes out into night, gasping as the heel of the new shoes Rosalie bought for her sinks into the mud. She retreats back to the porch and tugs them off, dropping them on the steps and hurrying out into the forest behind the house.

She stops, sniffs, and keeps running. She can hear her family members behind her, calling both her and Jasper's name, but she ignores them. _I shouldn't have left him_, she thinks wildly. _If anything happens..._

"Jasper, where are you?!"

"Alice..."

"_Jasper_!"

"What's the matter?" he asks, taken aback when she rushes towards him and presses her face into his chest, wrapping her arms around his waist tightly. "Alice?"

"I thought -- you didn't come back with the others, and..."

"What are you _wearing_?"

She sniffs and looks down at her lilac, knee-length dress. "Just some stupid outfit I bought today, oh, _Jasper_ you scared me so much... where were you?"

"I needed more," he says quietly, "I'm not as easily satisfied as the rest of you, Alice, remember?"

"Yes. Yes, I remember, I just... _oh_. Don't do that to me anymore... I'm going with you from now on and--"

She can't say anything else because his hands on the side of her face and his lips are pressed against hers. She stands there on her tiptoes for a long moment, completely still from shock of being caught off guard. When she comes to her senses again, she stands higher on her toes and reaches up to tangle her hands in his hair.

"I'm sorry," he whispers in her ear after he pulls back and wraps his arms around her, lifting her up off the ground. "I didn't mean to frighten you."

"Doesn't matter," she mumbles. "Don't remember what I was worried 'bout, anyways..."

He grins up at her, and it's in that moment that she realises what Esme and Rosalie meant. She'd know when the time came...

She knows.

Alice wants this man; she wants him in more ways than she ever has wanted, or has ever had him, before. She wants him to be hers and only hers. She wants to drag him back to the house, to their room and she wants to make love with him for the entire night, and the next day, and the day after that.

"Alice?"

Alice gasps, curling her hands into fists on his back, gripping the fabric of his shirt in her fingers. She's blinded temporarily, and then she sees it. The future. But not the future she was thinking of. She sees _her_... small and dark, with wild crimson eyes and a vicious expression of pure rage and fury on her face.

Jasper's face returns to her, and Alice stares wide-eyed at him. _He doesn't need to know_, she thinks. _Not now. Not yet_.

And she won't tell him. She won't tell him because the future is subject to change. She won't tell him because she doesn't know the outcome... because she doesn't want to face the fact that it's probably truth.

She won't tell him that Maria will return.


	8. Words Are Cheap

Because You Loved Me

Part 8/?

_**Words Are Cheap... **_

For the next few months, Alice is extremely quiet. She declined invitations from Esme and Rosalie to go shopping, and she seems to panic slightly on the rare occassions that she realizes Jasper has gone somewhere without her. When questioned about her behavior, she simply shakes her head and says, "I don't want to say anything until I'm sure."

Jasper's hunting trips are down to twice a day - once when evening falls and once before the sun rises - but he still has not gone into town with the rest of the family.

"Where do they go when they leave?" Alice asks one day. She, Esme and Jasper are lounging in the family room; Esme is teaching Alice to paint. Alice thinks she may have liked this in her human life.

"Carlisle works at the hospital, as you know," Esme replies, dipping her brush into a particularly bright orange, "Rosalie, Emmett and Edward go to university. The weather here allows it."

"University? We can _do_ that? Oh, Esme, when can I go? There's so much I don't know. School would be good for me."

Jasper scowls slightly at the idea of Alice being gone for most of the day; he knows he wouldn't be able to join her. Not unless he wanted to see details of a massacre on the front page of the morning newspaper.

"School would be perfect," Esme agrees. "But you have to learn your basics first. When we move again, they're going to enroll themselves in high school. It will allow us to stay a little longer - the younger we start, the longer we can stay without people noticing that we aren't aging. I will teach you, catch you up with the others. You'll have to learn the math, and do a fair bit of reading."

Alice bounces on her stool, then frowns when a dollop of pink paint drops onto her knee. She turns and looks over her shoulder, her mouth open to speak, but she simply smiles when she sees Jasper holding out a paint-covered towel. "Thank you, Jasper."

"That's a beautiful dress, Alice."

She looks back to her painting - a pink and lavendar knee-length design. "Thank you."

"You could easily design fashion, I think."

"Do you? What do you think Jasper? ....Jasper?"

Alice stands, her eyes darting around the room. He's gone.

Jasper slows his pace to a brisk walk and shakes his head as he glances over his shoulder at the house. One more word of fashion and paint and schooling, and he fears his head will explode. The woods behind the house was his only comfort now that the others were gone. He loves Alice to pieces, but sometimes...

He pauses and frowns at the ground. Kneeling, he reaches out and runs his hand over the damp path; his fingers trace the outline of a small boot. Alice didn't know any boots that he knew off, and Rosalie refused to wear anything that didn't have a heel of at least three inches on it.

This was a flat, regular boot. Freshly made.

Since they'd moved in with the Cullens, Jasper hasn't heard even a whisper of another vampire. His eyes scan the length of the path, and he finds only two pair of prints: his own, which he just made, and the other. Besides the prints, however, there is no sign of anyone ever being here.

"Jasper!"

He spins around, desperately trying to override the automatic defense mode that his body is trying to go into when he sees Emmett's face approaching him through the trees. He closes his eyes and rocks his head from side to side, trying to calm himself. What's the use of having the ability to manipulate emotions if he can't use it on himself?

"Emmett. I thought you were off gettin' a proper education."

"I was. School's out." He grins a large, boyish grin and claps Jasper on the shoulder. Too hard; he stumbles forward a bit. "Sorry."

Jasper's lip curls involuntarily; Emmett was clearly the youngest of the family, which meant his strength was greater even than his own, but Jasper suspects that he was quite a large and strong fellow even in his human life. He wonders briefly what he did then.

"That's alright."

"So, hey, s'just you and me now. Tell me your story."

Jasper raises an eyebrow. "My _story_?"

"You must've gotten all those medals on your coat from somewhere. Oh, Esme says she can fix that, by the way. All the tears and holes in it."

Rubbing at his forehead, Jasper sighs. This one talks almost as much as Alice, and nearly four months still hasn't been enough time to get used to it. "I was a soldier during the Civil War, a major. I was turned then, and became a soldier for someone else. That's all you need to know."

"Or all you're willing to share?"

Irritated, Jasper changes the direction of questioning. "And what's _your_ story?"

Emmett is quiet for a moment, then leans back against a tree. "I was a photographer for National Geographic. We were doing a story on the seasonal habits of large mammals, one article to be published every week. We were doing great; all of our work had been done ahead of schedule, so we moved onto our next article early. Bears were our next topic. We camped out the first night, and the next morning I woke before my partner did. I decided I'd get a little bit of work done before breakfast..."

He trails off, and Jasper frowns at the emotion coming from him. A sense of loss, and, even all these years later, a little bit of fear.

"That bear came outta _nowhere_, man. One minute I was getting a picture of two butterflies on some flowers, and the next this row of teeth was in my face. I think she must've had some cubs around and felt threatened. Anyway, I don't really remember much after that. Just Rosalie."

"She saved you?"

Emmett nods. "My angel, I call her, because I thought I'd died... seeing something that beautiful after being face to face with something so horrible... you'd think the same thing, too."

Jasper doesn't doubt him. "Sounds like you were lucky she was there, then."

"Beyond lucky. ...I know you don't like Rosalie, Jazz --"

"_Jazz?_"

" -- but she really is a good person. Deep down. ...Past all the snow and glaciers and walls of ice. She only wants to be accepted; it's all she's wanted her whole life."

Looking at the ground, Jasper sighs. He starts to say something, to tell Emmett he knows what Rosalie wants because he can feel it every time she's around - that longing to be the center of attention, that longing to be the most beautiful thing in the room - but another voice interrupts him.

"You'll learn to deal with her." Edward has appeared by Emmett's side. "Or just ignore her, like I tell everyone else. I do."

Jasper suddenly feels very uncomfortable here, sitting in the middle of a dirt path and discussing family issues with two fellow vampires. He's never had a long conversation with anyone but Alice, and he isn't quite sure what to say.

"What about Alice?"

"What?"

Edward shrugs a shoulder. "You were thinking about her."

"Stay outta my head, kid," Jasper scowls.

"It's not like I can just turn it off. You of all people should know that."

Jasper looks up and, for less than a second, he locks eyes with Edward. He _does_ know; the anger, the irritation at feeling (or in Edward's case, hearing) things that you were never meant to...

And being able to do absolutely nothing about it.

Emmett stands. "You two doing some freaky mind thing or something?"

"No," Edward says, rolling his eyes.

"Good, 'cause I hate feeling left out."

"Sometimes, you can't help it, Emmett."

* * *

Jasper stands outside the bedroom door, his hand on the knob and his forehead resting on the frame. He'd had another talk with Edward after returning to the house; one that made him think. He'd been standing up on the roof, watching the lights from the city. He'd been up there for hours, having told Alice that he just needed time to himself. She'd pouted, but respected his wishes.

"You should tell her." It was the first thing Edward had said when he reached the roof. Jasper had simply rolled his eyes and looked away. But Edward wasn't giving up. "It's why you're avoiding her, isn't it? You can't do that forever."

"I know you can't help hearing my thoughts," Jasper had snapped, "but, contrary to your obvious belief, I don't need your opinions on them."

"I'm only trying to help, Jasper..."

"Don't."

"She wants to hear it. She thinks you're drifting away from her, and she's afraid."

Jasper didn't speak, and Edward didn't push. He'd simply left him alone on the roof to think about what he said; Alice thought she was losing him. Distancing himself from her had not been his intention at all, but now that he looked back on his actions, he knew what he had done.

He knew, too, what he should do.

So now, he stands outside their room going through the conversation in his head. He's never been good at this kind of thing, and he's not sure where to even start. He's not even sure if he's ready.

"Jasper, why are you just standing out there?"

He glares at the door. "I'm not just standing here, Alice."

"Yes you are."

His expression softens, and he chuckles a bit as he opens the door and steps into the room. "I was thinking."

"...Outside the door?"

"Yes, Alice."

She smiles up at him as he sits next to her on the bed, and peers over her shoulder at the new dresses she's drawn. "Do you like them? Esme says next time we enroll in university, I can go and get a degree in fashion."

"They're beautiful," he says, and when he leans down to place a kiss on her shoulder, she giggles and shies away. "Alice --"

"You can go, too, you know. I mean, eventually. Maybe we'll have the same classes. Rosalie said her and Emmett got separated their first year, but it worked out in the end. _Oh_, and I really want to take some art classes, too, I could use some instruction. And..."

Jasper sits there on the edge of the bed, listening to talk ninety miles per hour, nodding his head at the appropriate times and always agreeing with what she says, even when he doesn't know if she's right. Somewhere between the time he'd sat down and the time the sun rose, they'd managed to make their way up to the pillows.

When the first rays of morning seep through the gap in the curtain over the window, Jasper is reclining against the headboard with his eyes closed. One arm is pulled up behind his head, and the other is wrapped around Alice, who has curled up into a tiny ball at his side. Even after the two and a half years they've been together, she still amazes him; he still doesn't know how it's possible for something so beautiful and powerful to be wrapped in such a tiny little package.

He decides then that it doesn't matter; she's here, and thank God for that.

Opening his eyes, he looks down at her and smiles to himself when she mumbles something incoherently. Sometimes, when Alice rests, he's discovered that she's graced with a series of visions. She may or may not remember them later, but he thinks it has something to do with the fact that, though she gives her body a break from time to time, her mind never stops.

She mumbles again, smacks her lips a few times and then curls into, if possible, an even tinier ball. He reaches up and runs a hand through her short, dark hair and, after several failed attempts at forming words, he leans down and places a small kiss on her forehead.

_I love you_, he thinks. _So why can't I say it?_

He knows why; words are cheap, meaningless. How many times since the beginning of time have those three words been thrown around, beaten and discarded like yesterday's leftovers? How many times have they been a lie?

Words mean nothing to him. What he _feels_, though... that's a different story entirely. It's there, he's aware of it every second of the day - a very faint tightness near the bottom of his chest, and it reminds him of a feeling he had in his human life when he were about to cry. It's painful sometimes, especially when Alice is hurting or angry, and he wants nothing more than to comfort her.

Now, though, it's the most overwhelming sensation he's ever felt. He thinks for one silly, fleeting moment that he can actually feel his heart beating again, once or twice, just to remind him that yes, it's still there.

"Jasper," Alice mumbles into his shoulder. "Stop trying so hard."

He looks down, and finds her peering up at him with her big, golden eyes. "What?"

"I know you love me," she whispers. "I don't need to hear it. I can feel it, and that's enough. That's more than enough."

"You want to hear it, though."

"What I want and what I need are two very different things."

"What if I need to say it?"

She closes her eyes and nuzzles her cheek into his arm. "Then you will, when the time comes."

He frowns. "Have you seen it?"

Alice has not seen this, nor has she tried. She hasn't seen Jasper speaking these words to her, in the near or distant future, because she hasn't looked for it. She doesn't want to see him doing something he isn't ready for, because that, she thinks, would be the worst vision ever.

"Yes," she whispers, the lie barely audible even to her own ears. She says it because she knows it's what _he_ needs to hear; he needs to know that he's going to say it. He needs to know this, because he needs to say it more than she needs to hear it.

"I have."


	9. Sometimes Letting Go Is The Hardest Part

Because You Loved Me

9/?

_**Sometimes Letting Go Is The Hardest Part...**_

The sixth of September 1964 was the night that Jasper Whitlock Hale's life would forever be changed.

Fourteen years they've been with the Cullens. Sixteen years they've been together. This night would be the one that tested all of that. This night would be the one that proved how strong their bond really was. And Alice, apart from a very vague vision a few years ago, had seen none of it.

Until this morning. She'd been sitting there, insisting to Edward that Rosalie would win the chess match, and then she was on her knees on the floor, gripping at the air in front of her blindly, her chest heaving and tearless sobs escaping her. The vision had hit her so quickly, so hard, that noone had time to react.

It had exhausted her to the point where she could only lie there in Jasper's arms, her eyes closed and repeating the same single word over and over again, as though it were the only word in the English language that she knew.

_Maria_.

They'd promised to let him handle this on his own; hearing it from him may keep her calm, they said. And who was supposed to keep him calm? His hands are trembling as he makes his way through the forest just outside of town, and his jaw is set tightly. Would he even recognise her?

Yes, he knew he would. Even now, admist the smell of fresh rain and wet leaves, he can pick up that very faint scent of cinnamon. Nothing else in the world smelled like that.

Alice had wanted to come with him, in case Maria wasn't willing to be peaceful. He'd told her that if she came, it'd probably make the situation worse. It was the truth.

A breeze passes through the tops of the trees and spirals down towards him, and on it is a whisper of his name. He freezes where he stands, his eyes wide and his hands clenched into fists at his sides.

"...Is that you?"

Her voice sends a chill up his arms, over his shoulders and along the back of his neck. His mouth goes very dry, and his tongue feels heavy. He forces himself to turn around and the sight before him sends a wave of pain through his system. He remembers her a young spunky girl, her eyes bright though they were full of malice, and a smile that could knock any man off his feet.

He remembers her alive. Not like this.

She's wearing a long, simple blue dress with a dirty white shawl pulled over her shoulders. The boots on her feet confirm that it was her prints he had seen so long ago, and she looks so pale and fragile that if the wind blew just the right way, she might break in half. She's hunched forward slightly, her eyes wide and uncertain.

As though she were afraid of something.

Afraid of him.

Jasper wants to say her name, to call out to her as he had done almost half a century ago, but his voice has left him. She stares up at him for a long moment, before doing something he did not expect.

Before doing something very... human. She covers her face with her hands, and drops to the ground. She sits there with her legs curled to her chest as her body sways back and forth, as she rocks herself in attempt at some kind of self comfort.

"Maria."

He crosses the space between them, and she gasps as he wraps his hands around her arms and drags her to her feet. He won't look at her like this. "It's true," she whispers when she locks eyes with him. "I heard from others, but..."

"What's true?"

"Your eyes," she says, reaching up carefully and brushing his hair off his forehead. "They're so beautiful... and you, _mi belleza_..." He pulls his head back, only slightly, but she catches it. Frowning, she pries herself from his arms and returns to the comfort of her shawl.

"Why are you here?"

"I looked for you. The night you left, Jasper, I... I fell apart. I killed everyone who was still with me."

He stares down at her, his mind racing through the memories of the ones who had remained to the very end. "Everyone...?"

"And then I started on the humans. Fifty died that night, at my hand, in less than half an hour. I didn't know myself anymore. I was afraid, Jasper, and it only got worse. I know what I must look like; not like the girl who led an army so many years ago. Now I fear my own shadow and... I long only to hear your voice. Speak to me, please."

He doesn't, because he doesn't know what to say.

"Do you remember a few nights before you left? Do you remember how we danced?"

_Yes_, he thinks. It had been the most peaceful night he'd experienced since his change. It had been only him and her, and the open night sky. The thought of leaving her had been so very, very far from even entering his mind then.

"Why won't you speak to me…?"

"What am I meant to say, Maria?"

"…I heard from others," she said, repeating her earlier statement. "Others who had seen you, seen the way you were living. I thought… I tried… but I couldn't, Jasper."

"You thought what?"

"I thought if I could live your way, we could…"

There's a sinking feeling in his stomach. Not regret; sympathy. "Maria, changing the way you live wouldn't have mattered. We'll never be the way we were."

She sniffles, and for a bizarre moment, he thinks that her pout reminds him a little of Alice. "Then you've found someone else…"

"Yes."

"Her name?"

"Alice."

"And you love her…"

Silence. Jasper watches Maria carefully as she kneels and reaches her arm out with lightning speed, grabbing a small rat that happens to be passing by. It hurts him to watch her do this; the woman who once held most of the power in the south, the woman who vampires and humans alike feared…

The woman he waged war and won impossible battles with, reduced to snatching rodents.

She drops the animal when she sees him staring, and covers her face with her hands. "I don't know where to go…"

"You can't stay here, Maria," he whispers. "It's not safe for you, or for us."

Maria nods her head, and her hand moves to very briefly pull on her own hair. Then, she steps to him again and holds out her arms. "You never said goodbye."

One look at her face, and he knows she isn't being sneaky; she has no tricks up her sleeve this time. She simply wants him to hold her one last time.

He hesitates for a moment, and then he wraps his arms around her carefully.

_Dance with me_. _Say goodbye_.

For hours they dance, like the night he remembers so clearly in his mind. For hours, he gives her a silent apology. When the first rays of morning are beginning to seep through the trees, she steps away from him and curls her fingers over the silver dove that hangs from a chain around her neck.

"I'll go to Mexico," she says flatly. "It's still home." Jasper is silent as she presses the necklace into his palm, and then presses her lips to the back of his closed hand. "You're happy. Stay that way."

And then, as though she had never been there in the first place, she's gone.

For good.

* * *

"Jasper!"

He winces as he enters the house, and the faces of his family flood his vision. Anxiety and worry mix with relief as their emotions flood him, but he pushes through. There's one face that he doesn't see.

"Maria?"

"She's gone, Carlisle. Where is Alice?"

"On the balcony," Esme whispers.

He doesn't give anyone else time to say anything to him. When he reaches their room, he stands in the open doorway silently, his eyes glued on Alice's back. She's leaning over the railing of the balcony, her head bowed and her fingers linked together.

Jasper approaches her slowly. She doesn't turn her head when she speaks. "That smell… is that her?"

He can't make sense of the emotion radiating off of her; jealousy, unimportance… a very, very small feeling. "She's gone, Alice."

"What did she want?"

He doesn't answer her, because she already knows; she saw and heard Maria's wish in her vision. "I told her I had you."

"You almost went with her." Alice turns and looks at him with empty eyes. "I saw that path chosen, too, Jasper."

The fact that Alice knows the thought of running back to his old life had crossed his mind is enough to make him want to find a very deep hole to crawl into. "That life was an easy one, Alice. Much easier than this."

"And yet, you stayed."

"I stayed for you."

Alice turns away from him again, wrapping her own arms around her body. "You love her, still."

"I will always love Maria. There's no point in denying that, Alice, and you're not naïve enough to think that I could ever stop. She created me, she taught me."

"And what did I do? I manipulated you into coming with me, into living this life, because I said I saw the future, and –"

"You _saved_ me, Alice. Had it not been for you, I'd probably be dead by now and there's no pointin denying that fact, either."

She looks up at him as he walks to her, and she tenses when he places his hands on either side of her face. "And what good am I now?"

"You're still saving me," he whispers.

"From what?" He thinks he detects a slight tremble in her voice, a weakness there that she's had ever since they met. A fear of being left, just like Maria.

He doesn't answer her, because this is one thing that he _is_ still denying. Instead, he gets a firm grip on her and pulls her up off the ground. He kisses her like he never has before; it's not seductive or passionate, and nor is a ploy to simply make her feel better.

It's one that lasts for hours, one that answers the silent question that she _really_ has going through her mind.

Jasper will not leave her; he's here to stay, no matter how difficult this life may be. He's here to stay because she _is_ still saving him.

She's saving him from himself.


	10. Because That Means It's The End

Because You Loved Me

10/?

…_**Because That Means It's The End**_

It's been four days since Maria shook Jasper's foundation. It's been four days since she left… four days since they found out from a friend of Carlisle's that a lone vampire had travelled to California and, in the middle of the day, began snatching people off the street until the Volturi had no choice but to intervene.

It's been four days since they received the news: Maria had committed suicide.

…It's been four days since they've seen Jasper.

And Alice… Alice has not moved from the spot she was sitting in when he left. She's at the kitchen counter, her knees pressed together, her bare toes curled around the legs of the stool, and her unblinking eyes fixed on the counter.

For four days, she has not said a word.

"…Is she gonna be okay?" Emmett wonders from the other side of the counter, watching Alice carefully.

"She's afraid," Edward says quietly. "Of what he'll do. Maria was his entire life before he met her… his companion, his teacher, his complete understanding of the world. She thinks a part of him might've went with her."

Rosalie slams her magazine shut and shoots daggers at the both of them. "Just because she isn't speaking doesn't mean she can't _hear_ you. Shut your mouths." Then, she sighs and rubs at her forehead before walking over to Alice and placing a hand over hers for a brief moment before walking to Emmett and pulling him away.

"Rose?"

"We should look for him," she whispers, so low that even the others cannot hear her.

"Why…? That guy's dangerous, Rosalie. If he doesn't wanna be found –"

"You think if you didn't want to be found, I'd just forget about you?" she snaps. "Maria might've been his everything a long time ago, but Jasper is her entire world right now, Emmett. If he doesn't come back soon she might just stay that way for the rest of eternity, and I –"

"…You going soft on me, hon?"

"It's not right," she says. "She's not meant to be this way."

Emmett makes an uncertain noise. "I dunno, Rose. Maybe it's best if he's away for a while."

"What, so he can deplete half the population?"

"Give it a few more days. If he's not back by Wednesday, I'll go with you. I promise."

"I know what you're thinking," Edward says unnecessarily. "He hasn't left you."

"He isn't here, is he?"

"Alice, he loves you. He's just lost right now; he needs time to get himself together."

"And did you hear him thinking that?"

"…No."

Alice responds with silence, as though Edward's own answer settled the conversation. Then, she sighs. "Leave me alone, please. I'm trying to get a vision."

"And what will you do when you figure out where he is?"

"I'll go to him. If he wants to live as a nomad again, I will go with him. If he –" she stops, and takes a sharp intake of breath, and then another, and another. "I have to... Edward……"

Slightly startled by her sudden deterioration, Edward turns her towards him and wraps his arms around her shoulders. "He'll be okay, Alice. I promise you that he would not just disappear on you."

But he had. Jasper had left her.

* * *

On the fifth night, she lies in their bed for the first time since he left. When she buries her face in his pillow, she inhales deeply because the scent left there is the closest she can be to him right now.

She lies that way all through the next day.

On the sixth night, she stands on the balcony and tries to catch a vision of anything: where he is, how he is. If he's even still alive.

On the seventh, at half past three in the morning, her eyes fly open when she hears the knob of the bedroom door turn slightly.

When Alice sits up, she thinks that if she still had a heart, it would've stopped. He's standing there in the doorway, his head down and his hands in his pockets. Under any other circumstances, she would've felt embarassed about being caught lying there in the bed wearing nothing but his broken-down coat.

Now, though, she doesn't care. She pulls herself out of the bed and walks to him, standing so close that her bare feet are just centimeters from his boots, and stares up at his face. He avoids her eyes.

"Alice, I—"

She reaches up and places her finger over his lips gently. "You came back."

"But, I—"

"You came _back_."

Jasper meets her eyes – two large, onyx orbs glistening in the moon – and he feels as though his legs might've been melted from beneath him. Alice stares, confused and a little frightened, as he seems to sink lower and lower until his knees meet the floor.

She bites into her bottom lip as he wraps his arms around her, and mumbles only two words into the soft skin of her stomach that's exposed due to a few missing buttons: _Forgive me_.

Alice takes a long, slow breath and reaches down to run her fingers through his hair. She felt strange, standing here like this; seeing a man like Jasper on his knees before her, begging for absolution.

She wraps her fingers in the fabric of his shirt, and pulls. "Stand up, Jasper," she whispers. "Please." When he won't, she takes her own place on the floor and reaches out to place her fingers beneath his chin; to force him to look at her.

To speak her forgiveness is not necessary.

Instead, she simply leans forward and clutches his face in her hands, so firmly that it's almost painful for him. She pulls him to her, and she doesn't need a vision to know that everything – every slip, every disagreement, every kiss and every painful moment of doubt – has led them to this moment on their bedroom floor.

She isn't afraid, like she thought she would be, and when her hands travel down the sides of his neck to the buttons on his shirt and he asks if she's sure, she simply smiles up at him and says that she's never been more sure of anything in her life.

The scars on his body fascinate her, and she takes the time to focus her attention on every single one of them; to memorize their location, their shape, their size, their depth – some, she learns, are only just on the surface.

On every one, she leaves a featherlight kiss; as though an improvised bandaid on the outside can somehow fixed the wounds on the inside. She takes her time, because that's all they have. She takes her time because she wants him to know something very important.

A part of his life _did_ die with Maria, a part that will never be fixed or repaired.

That part is over.

Tonight, his life starts with _her_.


	11. Taking The Chance

Because You Loved Me

Part 11/14

_**Taking The Chance…**_

It's May 1968, and Jasper is just beginning to think this new life may not be so terrible after all. It's taken time, but he's adjusted to hunting wildlife twice a day. He's become more comfortable with his new family and, oddly enough, bonded with Edward in particular. He thinks it may have to do with the similarities in their gifts. They have an understanding of each other.

He's come to see Esme and Carlisle as, for all intents and purposes, his mother and father. After all, they have raised him in a way; retaught him the ways of life, told him right from wrong. Emmett is always there when an a good wrestle is needed, to relieve stress or irritation, and even Rosalie has calmed her attitude with him down considerably.

And Alice…

Alice has been the most supportive, unsurprisingly, but even his relationship with her has changed. She doesn't worry when he comes back late from hunting, and he's realized that sometimes a girl just needs to shop. He's not as anxious when she leaves the house without him, now.

He's nervous today, though. Not because Alice isn't in the house, but because he's _out_ of it. Though life has progressed in a constantly positive manner for him, he still has trouble being in public. He still has trouble with those terrible urges…

Still, he's put those worries aside, at least for today. After all, as Carlisle had said earlier, how will he ever get over the problem if he just keeps running from it? He assured Jasper that nothing would happen; the family would make certain of that.

And he's grateful, because he _needs_ to be here. Alice is going through her very first graduation from college today, and he needs to see her walk across that stage in her maroon gown and hat, and take that little piece of rolled up paper.

A degree in fashion design and management, just as she'd promised herself. And Alice always kept her promises.

He's seated between Carlisle and Esme in the lawn chair, his eyes studying the sky carefully. The clouds are there, but they're dangerously thin. Alice had checked the weather forecast, though – her own – and promised that the clouds would be there all day.

Still, Jasper's on edge. His jaw is tight, and his hands are folded together so tightly that he fears he may be in danger of breaking his own fingers.

"Relax," Esme whispers in his ear. "You're doing fine. Alice will be proud."

She pats his hand for comfort, and then pries his fingers apart. He lets her, because he really doesn't want to hug Alice later with a broken wrist.

"How long is it again?"

"Two hours," Carlisle says. "Not long at all. She'll be one of the first to cross the stage since they're going in alphabetical order."

_Yeah_, he thinks. _Maybe not for you. _

Two hours was like another eternity to Jasper.

His anxiety quickly changes to slight feeling of excitement when the ceremony begins, and an Amanda Adams crosses the stage. There's a Brandon Anderson, and a Jamie Calhoun and three or four other names he didn't pay attention to before he finally sees Edward cross the stage, followed by Emmett.

"Alice Cullen!" the Dean calls from the podium, and a wave of amusement passes through him as a tiny little pixie hurries across the stage. She had no idea what she looked like scuttling along behind her hulk of a brother.

Jasper can't help the smile that crosses his face when he sees her accept the degree, and turn her head towards the crowd with a large grin plastered on her face. She waves animatedly when she spots her family, and Esme stands and cheers loudly for her.

After a few more students cross, they applaud for Rosalie, as well, who makes a show of blowing a kiss to them from the stage.

After the ceremony is over, Jasper let's Carlisle and Esme lead him through the crowd while he holds his breath and tries to ignore the alarming number of people who stop to stare at him.

"Most of the people here know about you," Carlisle explains to him from behind, with one hand on his shoulder, "because of Alice. But they've obviously never seen you. I think most of them were beginning to think we'd made you up. Just keep walking."

"Jasper!"

He barely had time to react before a tiny body engulfed by a long graduation robe throws itself into his arms. He laughs, and hugs her. "Alice… congratulations. I knew you'd do it."

"Me too! Ooh, I'm so excited! I can't wait to go again, I think I'd like a degree in European History."

Jasper's eyebrows shoot up, as he sets her back on the ground. "Slow down, Alice, you only just got that one. You can't go again until we move."

She pouts, but the expression is quickly replaced with another smile. "Nicole!"

Jasper panics as a small girl with long dark hair approaches them. "Hello!"

"Just relax," Alice mumbles to him, so quickly and so low that Nicole can't hear. Then, she quirks up again and bounces on her toes. "This is Jasper; remember, I told you about him."

"Ooh, _Jasper_," Nicole says, drawing out his name and grinning. "She certainly has told me about you, and now I see you in person I have to admit that she wasn't exaggerating at _all_. I was in Alice's art class."

He forces a smile, and tries to keep his shoulders from tensing when she extends her hand to him. "Hello, Nicole."

"Cold hands," she says, laughing a bit when he accepts her greeting.

"Sorry."

"Well, you know what they say. Cold hands, warm heart. I really gotta run, Alice, my family's waiting, but I promise to write!"

The two girls exchange hugs, and Alice watches Nicole disappear in the crowd before turning back to Jasper. "See? You can do it."

He decides not to tell her that he almost took Nicole's arm off.

* * *

"What are you doing?"

Alice frowns when Jasper closes the catalogue he'd been looking at. "Nothing."

"Jasper…"

"Well, I didn't get you a graduation gift, so I thought I'd find one in here."

She smiles and wiggles her way between the sofa and his back, wrapping her tiny legs around him from behind and he raises an eyebrow at her as she begins to draw little designs on his back with her fingers.

"What, did you run out of paper, Alice?"

Alice giggles. "No, silly. I was thinking of making you a fancy new shirt."

"…Please don't make it purple."

She rests her head on his back for a moment, before wrapping her arms around him and squeezing gently. "I'm so glad you came today, Jasper. It means so much to me."

He reaches back, and taps her nose. She wrinkles it at him, and he laughs. "Who knows, maybe next time I'll walk across with you."

"That'd be wonderful. I'd really, really like that."

Then, she stands and hops over the back of the sofa. He watches her arm extend slowly to the coffee table, and when he realizes what she's doing, he snatches the catalogue. "No, ma'am."

Alice's mouth drops open. "I want to see!"

"No," Jasper says, shaking his head. "It's supposed to be a surprise. If you see, it won't be."

She pouts, and then tackles him without warning. It surprises him that he has trouble getting away from a woman less than half his size, who probably weighs less than a large housecat, but he does.

When he finally makes it out of her grip, he scrambles off the sofa and stands, holding he catalogue up above his head.

"That is _not _fair. …I can jump that high, you know."

"Oh," he taunts. "Can you?"

"Yes."

Alice's legs bend, and she starts to leap up. Frowning, she wonders why she hasn't gone anywhere. "…Get your hand off my head!"

"I thought you could jump that high."

"I can, when there isn't a _brick_ stopping me!"

He grins down at her, and moves the catalogue behind his back, watching her carefully as they circle around the coffee table. "Jasper! Let me _see_."

His amused expression quickly changes to panic when she leaps across the glass table at him. He drops the catalogue, wincing when he loses his footing and his back hits the floor. "You're an extremely violent young lady."

Alice grins, obviously proud of herself for gaining the upperhand. Then, she pokes her bottom lip out at him and bats her eyes. "Please show me?"

He looks at her for a moment, then lifts his head up and kisses her gently. "You'll see it soon enough, Alice. I promise."

She sighs, clearly not happy with this answer, but she doesn't push anymore. Instead, she stands and pulls Jasper to his feet. "Come on."

"Where are we going?"

"Well," she says, leading him to the doorway. "I couldn't eat the graduation cake, good as it looked, so I thought I'd have a Graduation Hunt instead."

Jasper shakes his head at her as he follows her to the trees.

Only Alice.


	12. A Perfect Fit

_Thank you all so, so much for your reviews thus far. They make me bounce in my chair with glee. ^_^ This series (and this particular part of it) has done better than I ever expected. You guys are awesome, and I love you all! *MWAH*_

_And now… one of the parts we've all been waiting for.._

Because You Loved Me

Part 12/14

_**A Perfect Fit**_

In the summer of 1969, Jasper, Alice has noticed, is beginning to act a little strange. She hasn't forgotten the incident with the secret catalogue on her graduation day, but now it's more obvious. He's been spending much of his free time talking to _Rosalie_.

On a rainy morning in July, Alice corners her sister in the garage. The blonde vampire, much to Alice's amusement, is only visible from the bottom half, which is sticking out from beneath the hood of Edward's car.

"What are you doing?"

Rosalie mumbles something that Alice can't hear.

"What?"

"I _said_," she replies, poking her head out and glaring at Alice. "I'm trying to fix our brother's car, because it's not running right. _Again_."

Alice always thought it was strange that Rosalie, of all people in the family, was the one to go to for automotive problems. "What's the matter with it?"

"Alternator, I think. Or the belt… you're not interested in the car. What do you want?"

Biting her lip, Alice folds her hands behind her back and tries to look as innocent as possible. "Is Jasper alright?"

Rosalie raises a perfectly arched eyebrow at her, then her head disappears back under the hood of the car. "Why do you ask?"

"Well. He's been. …Talking to you."

For the first time since Alice has been in the family, Rosalie laughs so hard that she actually snorts. "Does talking to me warrant a check of the mental condition?"

"No. …Not really. Not unless it's Jasper. …He's up to something, isn't he, Rosalie?"

"Alice. Even if he were, I probably wouldn't tell you, because men are men and trying to understand them is the worst thing in the world that a female could ever attempt. …But I know nothing."

"You're lying!"

"I am not."

"Yes, you are. Your voice gets all scratchy when you lie."

Rosalie glares out at her again. "My voice is perfectly fine, thank you."

"Rosalie!"

"Alice."

Alice stomps her foot and crosses her arms. "I'd tell you if _Emmett_ were up to something."

"No, you wouldn't, because Emmett is never up to anything, and if he is, he always tells on himself because he can't keep his mouth shut."

"….Really?"

"_Alice!_" Rosalie folds her arms and stares at Alice's back as she rushes up to the house. Then, she calls after her loudly, "He won't tell you either!!"

"Emmett?"

"Oh, no."

Alice hurries after her brother, who looked up, saw her coming and immediately tried to leave the house. "Why does everyone know but me?!"

"Know?"

"Don't play dumb."

"Who says I'm playing?"

Edward leans against a pillar on the porch and grins at Emmett and Alice. "She got you cornered?"

"I'm going to have you cornered, Edward Cullen, if you don't tell me what's going on!"

"You've got big threats for someone so tiny."

Alice narrows her eyes. "You know what they say about dynamite and small packages, don't you? _**Tell me!!!**_"

"You know," Emmett says, "I think it's kind of amusing that she hasn't had a vision yet."

Edward nods, "He must be very good at avoiding her ability."

Alice's mouth drops open again. "Then he _is _up to something!"

Emmett claps Alice on the back, then frowns as she stumbles forward so much that she ends up off the porch. "Sorry, Lucky Charms."

"Don't call me that!"

"Hunting, Emmett?"

"Absolutely."

Alice glares after her two brothers as they push by her and sprint towards the trees. Then, she sighs dramatically and flops down on the porch, her legs crossed and her arms folded. A pout is plastered on her face, and she decides that she isn't moving until _someone_ tells her what her partner is planning.

* * *

"Alice? …What are you doing on the porch?"

She sniffles and checks her watch. It's been seven hours and sixty three minutes since she sat down. "I'm waiting for someone to tell me what you're up to."

Jasper kneels next to her. "So… you've decided to just… block the doorway?"

"I don't take up much space; they can step over me."

He chuckles, and she peers down her nose at his hand as he holds it out to her. "Hmph."

"You want to know, don't you?"

Alice rolls her eyes up to look at him. "Really?"

"Well, I was going to wait a few more days, but… that's just me procrastinating. There's really no reason to wait."

He wiggles his fingers at her, and she takes his hand and lets him pull her to her feet. He walks a few feet ahead of her, and she makes no attempt to hide her confusion at being led around to the back of the house.

It's open back there, no trees for a long while. The sun is just setting, and Alice smiles as she admires the way the light bounces off his skin.

Jasper stops halfway through the clearing, but he says nothing. Alice chews on her bottom lip and peers up at the sky, trying to figure out what it is he's watching so intently, but all she can see are thin purple and pink and orange clouds.

"Jazz…?"

"You know, I used to think about this all the time when I was human. I thought about how it would happen, who it would happen with. When it would happen. After I met Maria, though, I lost sight of this. I became accustomed to the fact that it just wasn't going to be…"

Alice blinks at him when he turns to her. "What wasn't going to be…?"

"And then I found you," he continues on as though she'd never said anything. "Well, you found me. However that worked out… and the things I used to think about came back to me. The little things, I mean. The human things."

She's holding her breath without realizing it, hanging on his every quiet word.

"Alice, I never imagined eternity would ever be a literal thing for me. I always imagined a life where I grow up, I have a family, I grow old and I die. But that's not going to happen now. I'm going to stay with way forever. …Why are you sad?"

She sniffles. "I don't know…"

"Don't be sad, Alice… this isn't a bad conversation. I know it sounds that way, but… well, I'll just get to the point. I'm happy now, happier than I ever have been. Even in human life. And it's because of you. And I think I'd like to stay this happy, with you. Forever."

Alice stares at him, wide-eyed. All the black and white romance films she's ever seen flash through her mind, and thinks about how silly she must have looked, sitting on the sofa dabbing at tears on her cheeks that weren't really there.

Wishing the girl in the film was her.

And now, standing behind their home with their family inside, in the middle of one of the most beautiful sunsets she thinks she's ever seen, the girl in the film _is_ her.

She covers her hand with her mouth as Jasper's knee meets the ground, and he holds his hand out to her. In his palm sits a tiny box, made of deep red velvet. As he reaches up with his free hand to open it, Alice thinks she finally knows what a panic attack may feel like.

The first thing she notices about the ring is that it is _not_ a diamond, and nor is it very large. It's small, petite, just like her: a thin silver band that holds a single tiny pearl in it's center. It's not traditional, it's not what one might expect.

And she loves it.

Alice opens her mouth to speak, but words fail her, so she simply stares there with her eyes locked on the ring.

"…This is what I was up to, Alice. I wanted it to be perfect, and I needed help."

Still, no words.

"Marry me, Alice," he whispers, so quietly that passing breeze almost carries his request away. "I want us to be this way forever."

_Speak!_ She scolds herself. _Have you gone dumb now?_

She nods her head once, twice, and finally a large smile breaks out across her face. "Yes," she whispers, and then decides it wasn't loud enough. "Yes," she says, the quiver in her voice evident even to her. "Yes, Jasper, I'll marry you. I want to be this way forever, too."

He mirrors her beaming expression, and, very carefully, removes the ring from the box. Alice holds out a trembling hand, desperately trying to keep her finger steady as she watches Jasper slide the ring onto it.

It's a perfect fit.

She doesn't give him time to stand before she throws herself at him, knocking him backwards as she had done earlier. He simply laughs and wraps his arms around her, placing a trail of little kisses from her forehead over her temple and down the side of her face before finally resting his lips on her hers.

"I think," Alice says after kissing him back, "that this is probably the best day of my whole life."

Jasper brings his eyebrows together as he looks up at the darkening sky. "How d'you know if you can't remember half of it?"

"Oh, I'm certain I've never felt this happy. I'm positive of that."

He chuckles as she reaches up with her finger and tickles the side of his neck, and then kisses him again gently. Then, she sighs and nuzzles her face into his chest.

They lie there that way for the entire night.

A _perfect_ fit.


	13. Something Beautiful

_I tried to post links to gifts Alice recieves in this chapter, but I couldn't figure out how to make them work. If anyone can tell me, I'll gladly post them in the final one. =(_

Because You Loved Me

Part 13/14

_**Something Beautiful**_

It's halfway through November, and the Cullen house looks like someone bought the entire contents of several hundred bridal stores and dumped them in the middle of the family room. The date's been set for New Year's Eve; a fitting date, Alice thinks, since it marks the beginning of new things.

The beginning of her new life as happy young bride.

This Saturday, the only family members in the house are Esme, Rosalie and Alice herself. Carlisle is working, and Edward and Emmett have (upon Rosalie's very demanding request) taken Jasper and gone to be fitted for their suits.

Alice has been grateful for the cold and rainy weather; fittings for dresses and tuxedos haven't been hindered by the sun.

Esme is sitting on the floor, holding up various pieces of fabric to Rosalie's face as the blonde chatters on the phone to someone – the florist, Alice thinks, or maybe the photographer.

"I don't _care_!" Rosalie yells into the phone. "My sister wants Spanish carnations at her wedding, and they'd _better_ be here on time or I'll _**rip your head off with my bare hands!!**_"

Alice flinches as she slams the phone down onto the receiver. "If you can't find any, Rosalie, it's OK. I can find something else…"

"No," she insists. "If you want Spanish carnations, you're getting Spanish carnations. I won't settle for anything less than perfect for my sister on her wedding day, because you and Jasper don't strike me as the type to do this more than once. It has to be right."

She decides not to argue the fact that it is _her_ wedding, and settles for continuing to write down the addresses of stores that sell wedding gowns. "These are all too…_big_."

"Why don't you design your own dress, Alice?"

She'd never thought of that.

* * *

When she's out hunting the next day, she finds it very strange that Edward asks to go with her. They make a game out of it, and on the way back to the house, he stops her.

"What's wrong, Edward?"

He shoves his hand in his pocket and frowns slightly. "I know you're not accustomed to all these wedding traditions, but… well. I'm sure you've heard it; something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue?"

Alice nods her head. She has heard of this, but she never thought it would be incorporated into her own wedding.

"Well, I… here," he says awkwardly, holding out his closed hand.

"Oh, Edward, you didn't have to get me anything."

"I didn't. It's something old."

Biting her lip, Alice steps forward and opens her hand. Edward drops a small coin into her palm. There's a butterfly enscribed on it, and, as he said, it looked _very_ old.

"My mother gave it to me," he explains. "When I was a boy. She said it would bring good luck in love."

There's a sinking feeling in Alice's stomach as she looks up at her brother. "Shouldn't you keep it, then…?"

He chuckles. "Nah."

"…I know you get lonely, Edward."

Edward sighs and looks away. "I'll find her," he says. "One day, maybe. Who knows, maybe I'll meet her tomorrow."

Alice grins and nudges him with her elbow. "Or maybe you've already met her."

"I seriously doubt that one."

They stand there for a moment in silence. Then, Alice races him back to the house.

He lets her win.

Alice thinks that perhaps the whole family has planned the Old, New, Borrowed & Blue tradition without her knowing. A few days later, Carlisle and Emmett stop her before she heads out to find fabric for her dress.

Emmett is holding something in his hand.

"What's this?" she asks, eyeballing his closed fist.

"Well… s'just something. Here ya go."

She opens the little black box that he hands her, and two small earrings peer up at her. Each one is made of three diamonds, fit into a vaguely triangular shape. "Carlisle bought'em but we picked them out together a few days ago."

Something new.

She bounces on her toes and thanks them, placing a quick kiss on Carlisle's cheek. She has to stand on a chair to hug Emmett properly.

That night after she returns from fabric hunting, she opts out of hunting with Jasper and instead gets comfy on the bed with her bridal magazines.

The soft knock on her bedroom door snatches her attention, and she's a bit surprised to see Rosalie step into the room. Her blonde hair falls loosely around her shoulders, and she's wrapped in a fluffy pink bathrobe.

Alice thinks she looks more beautiful than ever.

"Hi, Rosalie."

"Hey," she says, sitting on the bed next to Alice. "Not long now."

"I know."

Rosalie sighs and scratches at the back of her head. "Erm… look, I'm not good at this sentimental stuff, Alice, but… well, there's something I want to show you."

Alice watches as Rosalie reaches into the front pocket of her robe, and pulls out a long string of tiny white pearls that match Alice's ring.

"Are they _real_?"

"Of course they're real," Rosalie snaps. Then, her tone softens. "And they've never been worn. They were given to me by my grandmother, and meant to be used on my wedding night. The one with Royce, I mean."

Alice suddenly feels very sad. She'd heard Rosalie's story, of how her fiancée and his friends hurt her, broke her and left her to die. "Rosalie…"

"I don't wear them at the ceremonies with Emmett because. …Well, it just doesn't feel right. I want _you_ to wear them Alice. They're meant for a first and only wedding… one like yours and Jasper's."

"Oh, Rose, what if I break them?"

"You won't, because I expect them back just the way I'm giving them to you." Rosalie stops, and takes a long, deep breath. Alice thinks she hers a tremble in it. "Wear them, Alice…wear them for me. They'll be beautiful on you. Please."

Alice stares at her, and then takes the pearls from her hands. "I will."

It's the first time that Rosalie hugs Alice. They stay that way for hours, and once, Alice thinks she feels her sister squeeze her just a little tighter than necessary.

Alice has just borrowed a part of her past that she'd buried a long time ago.

"Esme? Can I come in?"

She's never been in their bedroom before; she feels like she's walking into some kind of sacred space. She's even afraid to put her feet completely on the floor, so she tiptoes in with Esme grants permission.

"How are you, Alice?"

Alice thinks about this. She's excited, anxious. But most of all…

"I'm scared, Esme. What if I… mess it up? I don't even know half of the guests, and… what if I start to say my vows and can't talk? What if I get cold feet? What if Jasper decides to change his mind?"

Esme laughs, sending an orchestra of bells through Alice's mind. "Oh, honey… I can't tell you how scared I was about my first wedding. You'll do _fine_. Come here."

Alice joins Esme by the bookshelf, and watches as she rummages through an old jewellry box. "I wore this," she said as she searches, "when Carlisle and I renewed our vows. You can have it, if you like. I know you already have something old and borrowed, but perhaps you still need something blue?"

From the box, Esme pulls a small pin whose sets are made of various shades of blue. "It's beautiful, Esme."

"I thought you could pin it to your dress, when it's finished."

Alice hugs her. "You're the best mom anyone could ever ask for."

Esme laughs and runs her fingers through Alice's short hair. "And you'll be one of the most beautiful brides when your wedding day comes."

She isn't so sure about that, but she lets herself think it's true. She hopes, at least, that she'll be beautiful to Jasper.

To her husband.


	14. Because You Loved Me

_The end… already. I just want to take another final moment to thank all of my readers, especially the ones who stuck with this series from the very beginning of Jasper's moments as a newborn in "About A Soldier."_

_If you haven't already, please read that one, which can be found on my profile here, as well as Alice's story, "Pixie Dust & Premonitions." They are the companion pieces to this fic._

_Some of you have mentioned a honeymoon chapter… keep a lookout (it won't be added to the end of this… it will more than likely be done as a separate one shot. Just for you.)_

Because You Loved Me

FINAL

_**Because You Loved Me**_

"Jasper, you gotta control that little gift of yours, man. You're making _me_ nervous."

"Sorry, Emmett."

It's nearing six in the evening, and there's just barely an hour left before the wedding is meant to start. Three or four times, Jasper had sneaked down to take a look at the guests. Carlisle and Esme had invited a coven from Alaska, and Rosalie and Emmett had remembered the names of a few fellow vegetarians that they had run across in their travels.

"Jasper, _please_."

He sighs, irritated. "I'm trying, you know."

The door opens, and Carlisle pokes his head in. "Jasper, can I speak with you?"

Jasper follows Carlisle out into the hallway, and away from the room a ways. "Sir?" The older man reaches into the pocket inside his coat, and pulls out a long grey box. Jasper frowns. "You didn't have to get me anything…"

"I didn't," Carlisle explains as he opens the box to reveal two cufflinks, studded with four tiny rubies. "My father gave me these, and they're one in a set of three. Emmett and Edward have the other two."

Jasper stares down at them for a long moment before he reaches out and carefully removes them from the box, turning them over in his hand. "…I don't—"

"I've given them to my sons, Jasper. You're part of the family, and I know you're not comfortable with it, but I do think of you as my son."

He lets Carlisle take the links and attach them for him, then he turns his wrist and lets the stones catch the light. He thinks that maybe, just maybe, it's okay to let Carlisle fill the place in his life that's been empty for so long.

He has his brothers.

He misses having a father.

* * *

Rosalie's pearls around her neck. Emmett and Carlisle's earrings snug in her ears. Esme's pin on her dress. Edward's mother's coin in her corset.

Dress. Shoes. Headpiece. Bouquet.

"Oh my God," she mumbles. "I'm ready."

"It's time."

"Alice? Esme, I think she just got _paler_."

"Just, sit her down. Sit down, Alice. …Do vampires faint? Where's Carlisle when you need him…"

"Alice? Look at me."

"I can't do this," Alice hears herself say. "I can't…"

Suddenly, she sees Rosalie's face very clearly before her. On it is a look that Alice knows means business. "Yes," she says firmly, "You can. And you will. Because I did not go through hell getting those Spanish carnations for no reason. I didn't get all sentimental when I gave you those pearls just for my health. You are gonna get yourself together, you're going to hold your head up, and you are gonna walk with Carlisle down that isle and you're gonna be the most beautiful bride those people have ever _seen_, do you understand me?"

Alice nods weakly.

"Now, you get out there and show them Mrs. Jasper Whitlock."

Yes, Whitlock. That's the name on the license, because that's _his_ name. She'll always be a Cullen, there's no doubt in her mind about that. But first, and foremost, she is Alice Whitlock.

Blindly, Alice lets Rosalie and Esme lead her down the hallway to Carlisle. He's acting in the place of the man who couldn't be there; he's walking Alice down the isle because her true father – and her human life – didn't last to see this day.

"Carlisle…"

"You look beautiful, Alice. Are you ready?"

"No."

"Yes, she is."

Numbly, she returns the hugs that Esme and Rosalie give to her. "We'll see you at the other end of the isle, Alice," she hears someone say.

She's shaking so much when the music that cues her entrance starts, she can barely hear it over the chattering of her own teeth. She wobbles on the three inch heels on her feet, and grips Carlisle's arm so tightly that she prepares an apology in case it pops off.

"Just relax, Alice," he whispers to her.

She doesn't see the guests seated on either side of her, doesn't hear their whispers about her custom dress design nor her headpiece, or the pearls around her neck. She doesn't hear the music, nor Carlisle's reassuring words in her ear.

She doesn't feel him patting her hand for comfort.

The only thing Alice sees is Jasper.

He's standing next Edward and Emmett, an expression on his face that, no matter how hard she tries, Alice can't name. She locks her eyes on his, because she finds that this makes her a little less nervous.

Until she starts thinking again.

How many times has she walked to him? How many times has she thrown herself into his arms, how many times have they hugged or kissed or made love until the sun had risen again?

Everything will change after this.

After this, she won't just be his partner or his companion. She'll be his wife.

When they finally reach the end, and Jasper steps forward, she nearly tumbles to the ground when Carlisle let's go of her. Jasper grasps her arm and looks down at her with wide, golden eyes. "Are you okay?"

Alice nods, because she wants to save her voice and, to be honest, she isn't quite certain if she'll ever speak again.

The vows are traditional ones, because no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't seem to write their own. Because there were no words to describe or express this commitment they were making.

When the priest comes to the part about death, Alice can't help but mirror Jasper's smile.

_Til death due us part_ won't happen for them, and it's then that it hits Alice: nothing will ever part them. When they say "for eternity," they really and truly mean it. She will remember this moment forever.

Forever.

When Jasper kisses her, it's soft and gentle; he was never one for public affection, and that's okay with Alice because that's the way she wants it: her husband, in all his old-fashioned glory.

Everything goes by in a blur for her after this.

They dance – with Alice's feet on Jasper's toes to give her a little more height – to a beautiful song that Esme helped pick, by a woman with a very strong voice. They open various gifts from people they don't know, and it all feels very _strange_ to Jasper until he hears a voice behind him that stops him in his tracks.

"Well, look what happened to man who said he wasn't gettin' swept off his feet by _nobody_."

Alice turns first, and when she looks up at Jasper with a confused expression, he forces himself to turn around, too. He knew who the voice belonged to before he saw the tall, dusky-haired man in the dark blue tux. Before he saw the statuesque brunette at his arm.

"Peter…Charlotte…"

Charlotte steps forward and wraps her arms around Jasper's neck. "I told you I'd like to see you again, didn't I?"

Peter shakes his head and folds his arms, "We got wind of the wedding, and when I heard the name of the groom, I nearly had a heart attack. Well, figuratively speakin' and all that. I thought they must've been mistaken, and we just had to come and see for ourselves. Major Jasper Whitlock with a bride of his own… it's just bizarre."

"And what a bride!" Charlotte says, fixating her eyes on Alice. "Your dress is absolutely beautiful."

Alice is glad she can't blush. "Thank you. I've heard _so_ much about you two."

"Good things, I hope."

Jasper frowns when Charlotte and Peter exchange glances. "…We also heard about Maria."

"…Oh. Yeah, she…"

"I know you don't want to talk about it, especially on a day like this. We just wanted to offer our condolences."

"Thank you."

"We can't stay," Peter said. "We just came to offer congratulations."

Jasper thanks them again, hugging them each once more before they say goodbye and disappear just as quickly as they came. Alice studies his face as he watches them, and imagines how he must feel.

"Don't worry," she says quietly. "I see them coming to visit you again in the future."

He looks down at her and smiles. Then, without any warning whatsoever he leans down, and, with one arm under her knees and the other around her shoulders, lifts her into his arms. "Let's get away from the crowd, hmm?"

Alice giggles. "Okay."

Jasper walks a ways before setting her down again. They're far enough away from the guests to be alone, but close enough to still hear the chatter and the music. "Like the dress," he says quietly.

"My own design was the only one that worked… everything else swallowed me whole."

He chuckles at the image of Alice in a dress six sizes too big for her, then reaches out and takes her hand. He twirls her once, and then she wraps her arms around his waist and rests her head on his chest.

They dance in no particular pattern to another slow song that drifts to them through the trees, and the silence doesn't bother Jasper until he hears a sharp gasp. Frowning, he looks down at Alice and, when she turns her head and refuses to look at him, he places his finger beneath her chin.

"Alice…"

She tries to turn away again, but gifts up when he grasps her face in his hands. What he sees when she _does_ look at him sends a shooting pain through his entire being. He reaches out and, very carefully, runs the back of his hand across her cheek.

Frowning, she reaches up and touches her own face. When she looks down, she finds that the tips of her fingers are wet.

Not real tears, of course.

Never real.

Alice pulls away from him, and rubs both of her hands over her face, wiping away the trails of venom that stream from her eyes.

Ashamed.

"Alice?"

"I'm not supposed to _cry_. Vampires don't _cry_."

Jasper places his hands on his shoulders and turns her around. "Why are you sad?"

"I'm not…_sad_, Jasper, I'm – I don't even know what I am. I'm _happy_. I'm so, so happy. I never saw this, any of this. I only saw us together. You don't know how many times I've imagined it, though. Never anything like _this_."

Once more, he lifts her head up with his hands. "Sometimes not seeing the future is a good thing, Alice. If you'd known, if you'd been expecting it, would any of this have turned out the way it did?"

_No_, she knows. _Probably not._

It's then that she breaks. She throws her arms around him again, buries her face in his chest and weeps. Not just for this moment, or this night, but for everything.

Because it's only now that she can. She knows these tears will never come again; she knows she'll cry once in all of eternity, because only once does something happen to someone like her to allow it.

Only once does something so tragic or, in her case, so beautiful happen to awaken that bit of humanity buried so deep inside that it's almost been forgotten.

Only once, and so she cries for everything she's wished she could cry for. She cries for a past she can't remember. She cries for whatever happened to her to bring her down this past. She cries for whatever brought her to this man.

Alice cries for her memories, and she cries for her visions of the future.

And Jasper… Jasper simply holds her, because, somehow, he knows that she's crying for him, too. She's crying for the very emotion he's about to burst with:

She's crying for the love. The love that was there when neither of them even knew it. She's crying because he loved her before he would admit it even to himself.

Because she loved him when she was human, before she even knew his name.

Because as far as anyone – even Alice – can see, one thing is absolutely certain: any time Alice doubts herself, anytime Jasper fears the torment of his past, they will be there to pick each other up again.

They'll be right there.

Always.


End file.
